Sunday, June 14, 2009

Sweet treats



It's been a while since I've participated in Magazine Mondays.  This is probably my least favorite time of year for cooking magazines.  I don't grill much, and my passion is baking (though I do cook as well).  As a result, a lot of the recipes that are out there in magazines during the summer don't hold that much appeal for me.  Oh, there are some I like, but it's not like the baking bonanza you see during the fall and winter. =)  But I still read the magazines, and one or two things will really jump off the page at me.

This particular recipe is one of them.  As I was paging through the June/July issue of Fine Cooking, I ran across a picnic article.  The dessert was Ginger-Spice Sandwich Cookies with Lemon Cream.  I love ginger in cookies.  And the idea of lemon cream was intriguing.  All I needed was a good reason to make them.  I finally came up with one a couple weeks ago.


With the end of school looming, I had a bunch of baking to do.  I made dozens of mini cupcakes for Brianna's end of year class party, for instance.  But I also wanted to make a small gift for her kindergarten teacher as well as something for the after-school care staff.  These cookies seemed perfect.  The dough was easy to mix up, and included ginger, cinnamon and cardamom.  In my haste to get them made, I didn't actually chill the dough before shaping it into balls, but it seemed to work out okay.  I only made the one sheet of cookies I needed right away, and chilled the rest of the dough for later.  I portioned the dough with my handy #70 disher.  Rather than rolling the dough balls in regular sugar, I used turbinado sugar.  I baked the cookies for about 12 minutes, then let them rest on the pan for a few minutes before transferring them to a rack to cool.  While the cookies cooled, I mixed up the filling.  It was pretty simple--powdered sugar, cream cheese and lemon zest.  I matched cookies together as well as I could by size and sandwiched them together.  My #100 disher was perfect for the filling.


The verdict?  I don't actually know how the teachers liked them, since it was the last day of school.  When I finally had a chance to try one, I was a bit surprised at how soft the cookie part was.  But I liked the lemon and ginger together.  Jamie's reaction was pretty much the same as mine.  A few days later, I finally had the chance to bake the rest of the dough, so I took some cookies to work, too.  They seemed to be well received.  I can seem myself making these again, maybe playing around with the filling a bit.

If you're a subscriber to the Fine Cooking website, you can find the recipe here.  Or pick up a copy of the magazine, since it should still be available.  Extra incentive--there's a great ice cream article by David Lebovitz as well.  And be sure to check out the other Magazine Monday contributions on Ivonne's blog.

6 comments:

  1. These cookies look delicious, Di! These are flavors I haven't baked with much, so it will be fun to try something different.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mmmmm... how amazing, ginger, spice and lemon. Perfection! ...and they look it as well!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yum, these both sound and look delicious! I love the ribbon you used in that bottom photo - so pretty!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yum! Those cookies look great. I'm sure that they loved them, too.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ver nice, Di! I think sandwich cookies are my favourite to make.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Mmm...those look insulin worthy! :D

    ReplyDelete