Welcome to 2013! Now that it's January, life is generally simmering down from the chaos and excitement of December. I've had a few unexpected days off from work and I've been enjoying them by 1) starting the mornings off with a goblet full of Mimosas, courtesy of a bottle of champagne given to me by one of the kids in my class and 2) reading for luxuriously long amounts of time on my Kindle. I'm currently re-reading the "All Creatures Great and Small" series by James Herriot. Three of the volumes were on sale for the Kindle edition awhile back and I bought them. I read a few of his memoirs wayyyyyy back in 8th grade. My mom told me about them and I was enchanted. They're the semi-autobiographical memoirs of an English country veterinarian in the 1930s through the 1960s. Apparently a very popular TV series in the UK was created out of the books. There are something like 12 total volumes, and I read one or two back then and was highly entertained. The set I bought now contains the initial book that opens up the story, about how James became a vet and how he started in his practice in the Yorkshire Dales with the eccentric Farnon brothers, which I hadn't read before. The stories are hilarious and mind-blowing, which isn't a combination of words you frequently see together. I'm really having a good time reading them!
I feel like it's always a letdown to post Christmas recipes and decorations after Christmas, but there is one recipe I feel I have to share on here. It's for a cookie I made over the holidays, but the great thing is that it isn't exclusively a Christmas cookie at all. Actually, by appearances (as seen in the finished photo below) it could totally be used for Valentine's Day. The pink glaze is perfect for that.
I read the Sunday paper faithfully and saw, in early December, that Parade magazine had an annual Bake-Off Recipe contest. The grand prize winner was for Chocolate Cherry Cordial cookies. These were essentially little balls of chocolate dough with a maraschino cherry inside, finished off by a cherry glaze. It sounded so different that I thought I'd try them. In the end, I made about 4 batches. I shared them with my family and my parents and siblings went crazy for them, as did Mr. My Blog for Bonnie. My sister, who doesn't even care for cherries normally, said she absolutely devoured these. They are simple to make and taste wonderful. As a matter of fact, I plan on making another batch this weekend, possibly even today. And definitely for Valentine's Day. There's a series of progressive photos below of the baking process, and the recipe is included in the link above. This is my new favorite cookie recipe and I'm going to plan on making them each and every holiday season from now on!
Happy New Year!
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| Balls of dough, rolled in sugar, about to go into the oven. |
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| A good rule of thumb: these are finished baking when the tops start to crack and crinkle ever so slightly, as seen above. |
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| The finished cookies with the glorious and cheerful pink glaze on them! These are wonderful! |
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