Get Cooking: 150 Simple Recipes to Get You Started in the Kitchen (45 page)

1.
About an hour ahead of time, unwrap the butter and place it in a large bowl. Use a table knife to cut it into 1-inch pieces, and let it stand at room temperature to soften.

2.
Adjust the oven rack to the center position and preheat the oven to 350°F. Put a little soft butter on a paper towel, a piece of waxed paper, or a butter wrapper, and lightly grease two cookie sheets.

3.
Pour the granulated sugar, and crumble the brown sugar, into the bowl holding the softened butter. Use a handheld electric mixer at high speed (or if you don’t have one, use a whisk, with enthusiasm) to beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the egg and beat well. (Use a rubber spatula to scrape the sides of the bowl a few times during this process.) Add the vanilla and peppermint extracts, and continue to beat for another minute or two, until everything is well combined.

4.
Combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, and salt in a medium-sized bowl, and whisk slowly to blend. Add this to the butter mixture, along with the chocolate chips, stirring with the spatula until the dough is thoroughly combined.

5.
Drop the dough by rounded teaspoons onto the prepared cookie sheets, spacing them 2 to 3 inches apart and flattening each mound slightly with the back of a spoon. (You will need to bake these in batches, so just spoon out as many as will comfortably fit on your cookie sheets.) Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, or until the tops of the cookies are dry and the bottoms are lightly browned.

6.
Let the cookies sit on the cookie sheets for about 5 minutes after you take them out of the oven, and then gently transfer them to a cooling rack using a thin-bladed metal spatula. Repeat with the remaining dough.

THE CASE FOR COOKIE SHEETS

If you’d like to become a frequent cookie baker, I suggest you invest in a few cookie sheets (the kind with insulated bottoms and no side rims). They’re cheap, easy to store, and most important, if you use them just for cookies and use a separate set of baking trays for savory cooking (such as roasting vegetables), you won’t have to worry about your cookies tasting like garlic or whatever you last roasted. If you don’t have cookie sheets, line your regular baking trays with foil to prevent this flavor spillover. For most cookies made with butter, you really don’t need to grease your cookie sheets, but it never hurts to spray them lightly with vegetable oil spray or grease them with a little softened butter.

intensely chocolate brownies

Makes 8 to 12 or possibly more servings

T
hese are insanely rich, dense, and moist, so you can cut them very small and they’ll serve a crowd. And I guarantee you, that crowd will be pleased. They’ll keep for several days in a tightly sealed container at room temperature, and they freeze well too. Be sure to allow time to let the butter come to room temperature for about an hour before you start baking.

1.
About an hour ahead of time, unwrap the butter and place it in a large bowl. Use a table knife to cut it into 1-inch pieces, and let it stand at room temperature to soften.

2.
Adjust the oven rack to the center position and preheat the oven to 350°F (325°F if you’re using a glass pan). Put a little soft butter on a paper towel, a piece of waxed paper, or a butter wrapper, and lightly grease the bottom and corners of a 9-by 13-inch baking pan. (No need to grease the sides.)

3.
Fill a smallish saucepan with about 2 inches of water, and place a heatproof bowl that is large enough to hold the chocolate chips directly on top of the pan. The bowl should rest firmly in place, clutched by the pan’s rim, and the bottom of the bowl should not be touching the water. Pour the chocolate chips into the bowl, and put the whole setup on the stove over low heat. Let the water simmer gently until the chocolate chips are all melted (there should be no solid pieces when you give it a stir). Remove the pan from the heat, and carefully, using pot holders or oven
mitts, remove the bowl of melted chocolate from the pan. Set it aside to cool a little.

4.
Use a handheld electric mixer at high speed (or if you don’t have one, use a whisk, with enthusiasm) to beat the butter (by itself, for now) for a couple of minutes, or until it becomes light and fluffy. Crumble in the brown sugar, and continue to beat at high speed (or with your own arm at its personal best) for another 2 minutes or so. Use a rubber spatula to scrape the sides of the bowl a few times during this process.

5.
Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well enough after each addition to thoroughly mix it in. Add the vanilla extract, and continue to beat for another minute or two, until everything is very well combined.

6.
Keep beating as you slowly drizzle in the melted chocolate. (If you are beating manually, you might want to get someone to help hold the bowl steady for this.) Beat well until the chocolate is completely incorporated. (The constant movement prevents the heat of the chocolate from cooking the eggs.)

7.
Sprinkle in the flour and salt, and stir (you can finally stop beating now) until they disappear into the batter. Transfer the batter to the prepared pan, taking care to scrape all of it in with a rubber spatula. Then use the spatula to spread the batter evenly.

8.
Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, or until the top springs back a little when lightly touched in the center. (They might seem under-baked, but they will firm up as they cool, and these are moist brownies. That said, if they seem too soft for you, it’s okay to leave them in the oven for a few minutes longer, until a toothpick inserted all the way into the center comes out clean. At that point, they’ll be cakey brownies, rather than fudgy ones.)

9.
Let the brownies cool in the pan for about 10 minutes; then cut them into squares of your preferred size. Let them sit for another 10 minutes or so after you do the cutting, so each piece can solidify. Then remove the squares from the pan and let them cool on a rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.

GET CREATIVE

• For Chocolate Chip Brownies, use an entire 12-ounce bag of chocolate chips. Put half the bag into the batter melted, as directed, and sprinkle the remaining (unmelted) chocolate chips into the batter when you add the flour.
  
• For Chocolate-Banana Brownies, mash a medium-sized very ripe banana into the butter when you begin.
  
• For Chocolate-Nut Brownies, stir ½ cup chopped walnuts or pecans into the batter just before spreading it in the pan.
  
• Use a strainer to sift a little powdered sugar over the top of the brownies after you slice them.
  
• Serve à la mode with vanilla or coffee ice cream, or as the base of a brownie sundae (see Chapter 9: Desserts).
  

cheesecake bars

Makes 24 bars

A
full-on formal cheesecake requires a special pan with a removable bottom and, generally speaking, a special occasion. These easy bars with a tasty cookie crust give you the cheesecake effect in a much easier way. They freeze really well in an airtight container. You can just take as many or as few as you’d like out of the freezer and enjoy them an hour later, once they’ve defrosted. Note that you’ll need to start softening the cream cheese about an hour ahead of time.

1.
About an hour ahead of time, unwrap the cream cheese and place it in a large bowl. Use a table knife to cut it into 1-inch pieces, and let it stand at room temperature to soften.

2.
Adjust the oven rack to a medium-low position and preheat the oven to 350°F (325°F if you’re using a glass pan).

3.
Melt the butter in a microwave-safe bowl in the microwave (30 to 60 seconds on high power), or in a small saucepan over low heat.

4.
Combine the flour, cinnamon, and ½ teaspoon of the salt in a large bowl, and stir briefly. Crumble in the brown sugar, and then pour in the melted butter, scraping it all in with a rubber spatula. Use a spoon or fork to mix the butter into the dry ingredients until uniformly blended. Transfer this mixture to an ungreased 9-by 13-inch pan, and pat/press it evenly and firmly into place, forming a crust that coats the entire bottom surface of the pan.

5.
Add the eggs, lemon juice, vanilla extract, the remaining 1/8 teaspoon salt, and the granulated sugar to the softened cream cheese. Use a handheld electric mixer (or a sturdy whisk) to beat all these ingredients together. Start slowly, so as not to splash, and then gradually work your way up to high speed as the batter comes together. Keep going until the mixture is uniformly blended. There will still be some small lumps of cream cheese, and that is fine. Pour this mixture on top of the crust, scraping in every last bit with a rubber spatula. There’s no need to spread it; it will form an even layer on its own.

6.
Bake for 20 minutes, or until the edges are lightly golden, the top looks dry, and nothing jiggles when you shake the pan. Remove the pan from the oven, and immediately use a very sharp knife to cut 24 bars with a gentle sawing motion, so as not to disturb the lovely top surface. Cool completely in the pan before lifting out the squares.

GET CREATIVE

• For a crisper crust, you can bake the crust on its own in the preheated oven for 10 to 15 minutes. Remove it from the oven and let it cool for 10 minutes before pouring in the cream cheese mixture. Once the crust is filled, return the pan to the oven and bake for 20 minutes as directed.
  
• For a deeper flavor in the crust, you can replace 1 cup of the flour with finely ground almonds. (Pulverize them to a fine powder in a food processor or blender, or look for ground almonds or almond meal in the baking section of the grocery store.)
  
• Add 2 teaspoons grated lemon zest to the filling mixture for extra flavor. Grate the zest from the lemon before you cut it open to squeeze the juice. Use a microplane grater (Get Cooking) or the fine holes of a box grater; or shave the lemon peel (outermost yellow part only) with a vegetable peeler, and then chop it with a sharp knife.
  
• You can top the cooled bars with your favorite jam or marmalade, spread in a thin layer.
  
• Garnish each square with a slice of strawberry and/or kiwi.
  

gingery gingerbread

Makes 24 servings

F
resh ginger makes this a more deeply flavored gingerbread than the kind you might have grown up eating. It’s easy enough to grate the ginger, especially if you buy a knob that is very tight and crisp. It should have no wrinkles, and the skin should come off easily with just a little scrape of your fingernail. Peel it, and then use a microplane grater (see Get Cooking) or the fine holes of a box grater to grate it directly over the bowl, so you catch all of the liquid and solids. The brown sugar can be light or dark; both work very well. Note that you’ll need to soften the butter for at least an hour ahead of time.