What I Learned On My Retirement Vacation

The baking is finished. Three treats made with no spares, which is not good. I like to be able to taste what I'm cooking, which is what I should and normally do. But for some reason this time when I doubled the recipes, when I should have had 5 dozen, I managed to only get 3. Apparently my cookies should have been a little smaller. But I did get twelve packs out of it, which is what I needed. They're a cookie or two shorter than what I was hoping for (sorry guys!), but still good.

Since I'm going to be on the road for the next couple of days and more out of the loop than normal, I'll share all three now to make up for it.

Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup peanut butter

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 large egg, slightly beaten

1 tsp. baking soda

3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Beat together everything but the chocolate chips until smooth and well blended. Stir in the chips. Drop dough by slightly rounded teaspoonfuls onto an ungreased baking sheet, about 2" apart. Bake one sheet at a time for about 7-8 minutes so that cookies are puffed and slightly golden, but still soft to the touch. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet on a wire rack for about 5 minutes. Transfer the cookies to the wire rack and let cool completely.

Makes 2 1/2 dozen.

I got chocolate in my peanut butter.

What I learned: Do NOT always follow the recipe verbatim. Ovens are different, pans are different, ingredient brands are different, altitude is different. Unless you're working in the same kitchen with the same everything the testers used, your end result will be different. The original version of this thing said bake for 10 minutes, my Mom (who is the source of all three recipes) changed it to 8, and I'm changing it to 7. By leaving the cookies on the sheet for a few extra minutes, the cookies still bake and I can monitor them a little more closely. But I was still burning some cookies on this one.

Chewy Chocolate Cookies

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup cocoa

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2 cup Karo syrup, light or dark

3 egg whites

Spray cookie sheets with cooking spray. Combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, and salt. Stir in corn syrup and egg whites until blended. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto prepared sheets. Bake at 350 degrees for 7-9 minutes until set. Cool on a wire rack.

Frost with a powdered sugar and cocoa frosting made with skim milk (or do what I did and dip the rounded teaspoonful in powdered sugar before baking).

Makes 2 1/2 dozen.

Not a test cookie.

What I learned: Always do a test cookie. I had just enough to do one, which I promptly burnt at 7 minutes. If I had made the cookies as small as I was supposed to, I would have been able to do a couple extra to figure out a better time. Instead, I hoped I wouldn't kill anyone and tried 6 minutes.

Caramel Candy
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup light corn syrup
2 1/2 cups light cream
4 Tbsp. butter
1 tsp. vanilla

Put everything except vanilla in saucepan and cook over a low heat stirring constantly. Cook until a very firm, but not hard ball is formed (about 45 minutes to 1 hour). Remove from fire, add vanilla, and pour into a buttered square pan. Cut into squares when cold and wrap in wax paper.

Parchment paper works too. Not as well, but it works.

What I learned: This one I learned the most from. Always have a chair while doing long-distance cooking. I gave up on the standing thing after about 10 minutes of constant stirring. Plus I now understand why my grandmother always had a chair either in or nearby her kitchen. It's not lazy, it's smart.

And when they say constant stirring, they mean it. Not as good as a gym workout, but definitely needed.

Invest in a good thermometer. This is one I learned a while ago, which is absolutely vital when cooking candy. They come with a list of terms and temps on them, so you don't have to do the cold water stage test (small spoonful of syrup being cooked is dropped into cold water to evaluate characteristics). For those in the lowlands, it should happen around 250 degrees. For those in the mountains, stick to the cold water stage test, since the thermometer has a tendency to lie when you change altitudes.

Finally, unless something magical happens at school, I don't think you'll be seeing me working as a confectioner any time soon.

And with that, the great cross-country move has begin. Talk to you Monday from New York!