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Coconut Lace Cookies
Photo updated using snapseed application.
Looking for another cookie to add to the cookie tray you give as gifts? These are very pretty. You can add chocolate drizzle to really make them look festive (I’d melt semi-sweet or cacao chocolate chips for the drizzle).
Easy to make, pretty to look at.
Coconut Lace Cookies
- 1 cup flour
- 1 cup regular oats
- 1 cup brown sugar, packed
- ½ cup shredded coconut
- ½ tsp baking soda
- 3 tbsp water
- ¼ cup butter
- 2 tbsp light corn syrup
baking sheet, bowl
Combine flour, oats, sugar, coconut, & baking soda in bowl, mix well. Add water, margarine & syrup and stir well. Drop by teaspoon onto baking sheet. Bake at 325° for 12 minutes until almost set, remove to rack to completely cool. Makes 2 dozen.
Cranberry Roasted Chicken
I was reorganizing the freezer today and found two bags of cranberries. Not possible! By this time I’m usually out and anxiously waiting for the season to begin again. But last year they were really inexpensive and I stocked up..then the bags got buried under vegetables. I took one out and thawed it, along with some chicken thighs. I used the recipe below, which is an adaptation of my original Cranberry Grilled Chicken from July 2010, but did a bit of experimentation. I lifted the skin on the thigh, seasoned and added the sauce between the meat and the skin. I replaced the skin, brushed it with olive oil and roasted at 400 degrees. The skin was crisp and flavorful and the meat was moist, tender and had cranberry infused through it.
No secret for anyone who reads the blog with any frequency that I love cranberries. This cranberry chicken is tangy with a sweet and tangy crust. Great with rice and a salad. I left out the marinade of cranberry juice and wine with this adaptation.
Cranberry Roasted Chicken
- 4 chicken thighs, bone in and skin on
- 8 oz whole berry cranberry sauce (I made my own from fresh cranberries)
- ¼ cup ketchup
- 1 tbsp brown sugar
- 1 tbsp vinegar
- 1 tbsp ground dried mustard
- ¼ tsp crushed garlic
bowl, saucepan, baking dish
In saucepan, mix together all ingredients except chicken, bring to a boil, stirring constantly, reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Loosen skin from chicken thighs, season meat, add 2-3 tbsp of cranberry mixture between skin and meat (I pulled the skin most of the way off, covered the meat with cranberries and folded the skin back over it). Brush the skin with olive oil and roast at 400 degrees until cooked through.
Thursday Recipe Exchange: Awesome Chocolate Chip Cookies
Time for cookies. Chocolate chip cookies to be specific. JeffreyW cleaned out his pantry one day and came up with the ingredients for his Awesome Cookies w/Coconut.
JeffreyW’s Awesome Cookies w/Coconut
There are a few recipes I get requests for often. My dark chocolate chip cookie recipe is hands-down the recipe that I get requests for the most. And instead of wanting a copy of the recipe, most people want me to make them, convinced they couldn’t get them to turn out as good. I disagree. There are a couple of simple tricks that make these foolproof. One is to melt the butter before mixing with the sugars. This gives you a crispy on the outside, gooey on the inside cookie. Another is to let the mixture rest in the refrigerator for 15 minutes or more, this brings out the toffee flavors in the dough. And finally, pull them from the oven just before they’re done and let them finish on the baking sheet for the last minute or so, this gives you a perfectly browned cookie and lets them set up just enough to transfer to a…PLATE. I’ve tried a baking rack and they are too gooey and get stuck on the rack. You can put parchment paper on it first, which I’ve done, but a plate works just fine.
Now, what’s your favorite type of cookie? Chocolate, fruit, sugar, peanut butter? I’m always on the look out for the perfect peanut butter cookie. I’m still looking…
Dark Chocolate Chip Cookies
- 2 sticks butter, melted and slightly cooled
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/8 tsp dash of salt
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 2 1/2 cups flour
- 12 oz 60% Cacao Bittersweet Chips
- 1-1/2 cups walnut halves, roughly chopped
mixing bowl and cookie sheet
Preheat oven to 375 degrees
Cream together butter and sugars. Add eggs and vanilla, mixing well. Sift together salt, soda, and 2 1/4 cups flour, then add to butter mixture, blending well. Add more flour as needed. Add nuts and chocolate chips. Refrigerate for 15 minutes or longer. Keep remainder refrigerated while baking each batch. Spoon onto cookie sheet and bake at 375 degrees for 10-12 minutes. Remove just before done and let finish cooking on the baking sheet. Cool on plate or baking rack covered with parchment.
Melting the butter gives you a chewier, crispier cookie. Letting it rest in the refrigerator enhances the toffee flavor from the brown sugar. Big cookie bakeries let theirs rest overnight before baking. I don’t have that kind of patience, I want cookie! Though I’ve been known to double or quadruple this recipe and refrigerate in an airtight container for a week and make a fresh dozen each day.
You can also freeze the dough balls on parchment paper placed on a baking sheet and then store the balls in an airtight container for quick baking later.
Cross-posted at Balloon-Juice.
Thursday Recipe Exchange: Zesty Lemon Chicken UPDATE w/Photo
Tonight was suppose to be about unusual fruits, but I never made it to the Asian Market to pick up the fruits I wanted to work with, so we’ll save it for another time. Instead I was in the mood to cook up a batch of this wonderful lemon chicken. It’s a bit labor intensive, so I don’t do it often, but it is oh, so good. Hopefully there’ll be pictures later, it’s about ready to go into the oven.
Let’s make this exchange about lemons and chicken. Do you have any favorite lemon recipes? Chicken? Lemon and chicken? And most importantly, what are your cooking plans tonight or this weekend? Hit the comments with your dinner plans. Next week: Mushrooms
Zesty Lemon Chicken
(adapted from Crème de Colorado – serves 6)
- 6 boneless chicken breasts
- 10 whole lemons, (enough to make 2 cups juice, reserve 2 tbsp for later)
- 1 cup flour
- 1 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tsp paprika
- 1 tsp black pepper
- 1/2 cup oil
- 2 tbsp lemon zest (grated peel)
- 1/3 cup brown sugar
- 1/4 cup chicken broth*
- 1 whole lemon, sliced thin
- minced parsley for garnish
skillet, bowl, baking dish
In an airtight container, combine chicken breasts and lemon juice. Marinate for 1 hour. Remove chicken. Pat chicken with paper towel, but don’t dry completely. Mix together flour, salt, paprika and pepper. Dredge chicken in flour mixture until well coated.
In large skillet heat 1/2 of the oil and fry breasts a few at a time until well browned, adding and heating more oil as needed. (about ten minutes) Arrange chicken in a single layer in a large baking dish. Sprinkle evenly with lemon peel and brown sugar. Mix chicken broth with reserved lemon juice and pour around chicken. Pace a sliced lemon on top of each breast and sprinkle with minced parsley. Bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes until tender.
*I added the broth to the frying pan, deglazed it and then added it to the baking dish. Yum.
Maple Sugar Glazed Bacon
Am I the last person in the world to hear about this? I casually mentioned I cooked some bacon in the oven in a thread at another venue and a comment there linked to a Google image search for “candied bacon”. The pictures there made me go straight to Amazon to order some maple sugar.
Sprinkle some of the maple sugar (brown sugar also works) on sliced bacon laid on a rack over a foil lined baking tray and pop it into a 400 oven for 15 minutes. 
Flip the bacon over and sprinkle sugar on the other side and give it another ten minutes or so.
This stuff is sweet enough to crumble atop a bowl of ice cream. My brief perusal of the recipes that a “maple sugar” + “bacon” Google search yielded gave me hints of several variations on the basic recipe. Some mentioned a mustard/sugar mix, others spoke highly of cinnamon as an addition, and more yet called for cayenne pepper. I may be busy tomorrow!
