Time to make the annual Hot Cross Buns for Easter Weekend / Good Friday. This year’s variation is distinctly “New Englandy”: Maple Cranberry. Not too sweet, very flavorful and extremely fluffy. Very pleased with the results!
I will be the first to admit that the idea for making fried egg linzer cookies for Easter was not my idea. It came from Flour Bakery + Cafe, but I loved it, and I make Linzer Cookies so often that I thought I would add these to the website. They are fresh, pretty and very spring-like…. and make me feel like having breakfast. Perfect addition to Easter Baskets!
OK, one more go at these “Really Big Cookie” Style of Cookie before I move on to something else. I decided the take the “Mega-Cookie” / “Bakery-style Cookie” to a new level by adding Rolos — you know, the caramel-filed chocolate candies? I froze them cut them in half and them added them to the cookie dough. Turned out — well basically like chocolate chip caramel cookies! I could have used the mini-rolos too, but the shops were out when I went looking. I’ll move on to something different now, but wanted to have one more go at them.
A few weeks ago, I made these Really Big Chocolate Wafer Mega-Cookies and they were really yummy. Precisely because they were actually really big. It gave them both chewy and crunchy bits. So I decided to make a variation on those, with somewhat traditional white chocolate and macadamia nuts. Equally as delicious as the original. This recipe makes about 35-38 really big cookies — like the size of my hand. And don’t skip the chilling part; it really makes the cookie what it is!
So, if you’re noticing a tread in the last couple of weeks, yes, I am indeed really getting into this “bread baking in a dutch oven” thing. In fact, so much so that I bought a second — smaller — enameled cast iron pot. I really wanted the Le Creuset one, but the 3 1/2 quart one there was $290 so I bought a “knock off” which was only $50. My standard 6-quart dutch oven makes amazing loaves, but I am a single person and I would die of carb overload if I ate that much bread. So I am making smaller loaves, for now, by cutting the recipes in half. You can do the math to get it back to “normal sized”.