mark_asphodel (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mark_asphodel) wrote2013-01-27 08:36 pm
mark_asphodel) wrote2013-01-27 08:36 pm
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Mark's Internet Test Kitchen, Part I (Deep Dish Cookie For One)
You know those recipes you see circulating the Internets? Not ones recommended by friends, like the Aztec Gold brownies myaru has promoted (which are, by the way, excellent) but the ones that just come out of nowhere and everyone posts them but no one seems to actually try them?
Imma start trying them. Today.
First up, we have that Deep Dish Cookie For One recipe from tumblr.
So, while my kitchen is normally well-stocked, it's been a rough winter and I didn't get up to my normal holiday baking, so I had to make some substitutions. Not to mention the OTT "healthiness" of the recipe struck me as gimmicky and off-putting, so I didn't much care about substituting little mini Nestle chips for "grain-sweetened chocolate chips," whatever the hell those are. I did have some actual organic eggs, though, straight from a co-worker's farm. :P
Anyway, so the first substitution was dark brown sugar for the light brown sugar 'cause the light brown in my cupboard was hard as a rock. Oops. And I really like brown sugar so I substituted that for the white sugar too. Then I went looking for the vanilla. I have on hand Bourbon vanilla, Mexican vanilla, and Tahitian vanilla-- I told you I keep my kitchen well-stocked. I usually put Bourbon vanilla in baked goods but the Mexican was easier to reach so I put that in instead. I don't think that one really counts as an alteration.
The vanilla caused a ten-minute digression. See, many years ago when we were young, newly-married, and pretty broke (so, 2004?) my most excellent spouse bought me a vanilla-making kit as a gift. For some reason I never bothered to actually make it and it's been sitting in the kitchen of our new house for three years now. While I was trying to decide which country of vanilla to go for cookie-wise, I looked at that poor sealed bottle with the two lonely vanilla beans in it and figured I really ought to do something about it. So I opened the bottle and checked the beans, which were still moist, fragrant, and non-moldy after all these years. I split them as directed, retrieved an equally untouched bottle of Michigan-produced vodka from the basement, poured the vodka into the vanilla bottle, sealed it, and stowed the vanilla/vodka mix in the "glitter room" in the basement to sit for the next four to six months. I'll let y'all know how that one turns out.
OK, back to the cookie recipe. So I didn't have whole-wheat pastry flour either, but I did have some cake flour and I used that instead. I carefully measured out the baking soda, threw in a pinch of sea salt and the mini chips, mixed it all up and popped it in the microwave for forty seconds. I then let the resulting puffy dome of chip-laden stuff cool for ten more seconds before digging in.
So is it any good? Uh....
1) It was cooked in a microwave. That means it's not going to brown like a normal cookie. That made it reminiscent of the microwave mix cakes I remember being coerced to eat in the late 1980s when microwaves were still new and cool and people tried to use them for everything.
2) Despite the fact that I carefully measured out 1/8 of a teaspoon of baking soda, I could taste the baking soda. Not in pockets from undermixing (if anything, I overmixed) but throughout the "cookie."
3) Maybe it was the super-fresh egg, or the cake flour, or the double dose of brown sugar, but this thing wasn't a cookie. It was fluffy-light and strangely dry-- I'd compare it to a slightly flattened muffin, but muffins tend to be moist. It belonged somewhere in the cake/quickbread category, though. I'd have expected the double brown sugar to make it more heavy and sticky, so I don't think the sugar was to blame. I'm guessing it was the combination of egg and flour that leavened this thing to hell and back. Also, clearly 1/8 tsp baking soda was too much for this poor little wannabe cookie.
Would I make this again? Well, I have more beaten egg in my fridge, so I may have to, but seriously? You want insta-cookies, go buy a roll of Pillsbury dough or a package of Nestle dough and dole that out to yourself as you feel the urge. They'd be better than this.
Verdict: Make these to spec if you make them at all. And quite frankly the reliance of this upon specialty ingredients serves as a severe limitation for quickie cookie joy unless you just normally keep whole-wheat pastry flour and such on hand. I never have.
Next time I think I'll try that Nutella cake made with just eggs and Nutella. That should go down real well with the spouse. :)
ETA: added link to the Aztec Gold brownies so everyone can enjoy them.
myaru has promoted (which are, by the way, excellent) but the ones that just come out of nowhere and everyone posts them but no one seems to actually try them?Imma start trying them. Today.
First up, we have that Deep Dish Cookie For One recipe from tumblr.
So, while my kitchen is normally well-stocked, it's been a rough winter and I didn't get up to my normal holiday baking, so I had to make some substitutions. Not to mention the OTT "healthiness" of the recipe struck me as gimmicky and off-putting, so I didn't much care about substituting little mini Nestle chips for "grain-sweetened chocolate chips," whatever the hell those are. I did have some actual organic eggs, though, straight from a co-worker's farm. :P
Anyway, so the first substitution was dark brown sugar for the light brown sugar 'cause the light brown in my cupboard was hard as a rock. Oops. And I really like brown sugar so I substituted that for the white sugar too. Then I went looking for the vanilla. I have on hand Bourbon vanilla, Mexican vanilla, and Tahitian vanilla-- I told you I keep my kitchen well-stocked. I usually put Bourbon vanilla in baked goods but the Mexican was easier to reach so I put that in instead. I don't think that one really counts as an alteration.
The vanilla caused a ten-minute digression. See, many years ago when we were young, newly-married, and pretty broke (so, 2004?) my most excellent spouse bought me a vanilla-making kit as a gift. For some reason I never bothered to actually make it and it's been sitting in the kitchen of our new house for three years now. While I was trying to decide which country of vanilla to go for cookie-wise, I looked at that poor sealed bottle with the two lonely vanilla beans in it and figured I really ought to do something about it. So I opened the bottle and checked the beans, which were still moist, fragrant, and non-moldy after all these years. I split them as directed, retrieved an equally untouched bottle of Michigan-produced vodka from the basement, poured the vodka into the vanilla bottle, sealed it, and stowed the vanilla/vodka mix in the "glitter room" in the basement to sit for the next four to six months. I'll let y'all know how that one turns out.
OK, back to the cookie recipe. So I didn't have whole-wheat pastry flour either, but I did have some cake flour and I used that instead. I carefully measured out the baking soda, threw in a pinch of sea salt and the mini chips, mixed it all up and popped it in the microwave for forty seconds. I then let the resulting puffy dome of chip-laden stuff cool for ten more seconds before digging in.
So is it any good? Uh....
1) It was cooked in a microwave. That means it's not going to brown like a normal cookie. That made it reminiscent of the microwave mix cakes I remember being coerced to eat in the late 1980s when microwaves were still new and cool and people tried to use them for everything.
2) Despite the fact that I carefully measured out 1/8 of a teaspoon of baking soda, I could taste the baking soda. Not in pockets from undermixing (if anything, I overmixed) but throughout the "cookie."
3) Maybe it was the super-fresh egg, or the cake flour, or the double dose of brown sugar, but this thing wasn't a cookie. It was fluffy-light and strangely dry-- I'd compare it to a slightly flattened muffin, but muffins tend to be moist. It belonged somewhere in the cake/quickbread category, though. I'd have expected the double brown sugar to make it more heavy and sticky, so I don't think the sugar was to blame. I'm guessing it was the combination of egg and flour that leavened this thing to hell and back. Also, clearly 1/8 tsp baking soda was too much for this poor little wannabe cookie.
Would I make this again? Well, I have more beaten egg in my fridge, so I may have to, but seriously? You want insta-cookies, go buy a roll of Pillsbury dough or a package of Nestle dough and dole that out to yourself as you feel the urge. They'd be better than this.
Verdict: Make these to spec if you make them at all. And quite frankly the reliance of this upon specialty ingredients serves as a severe limitation for quickie cookie joy unless you just normally keep whole-wheat pastry flour and such on hand. I never have.
Next time I think I'll try that Nutella cake made with just eggs and Nutella. That should go down real well with the spouse. :)
ETA: added link to the Aztec Gold brownies so everyone can enjoy them.
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