Winning a 2020 Cookie Marathon

Too much time on my hands due to Covid-19 home confinement? The love of a challenge? The desire to apply a sport’s skill set to something other than exercise?

Who knows what possessed me but two weeks before Christmas I went into culinary overdrive with a cookie-making marathon.  The original concept was to make cookies from around the world so that Mary Boss, my nephew’s wife who home schools her children, could use it as a geography lesson plan. Call it a global adventure in a cookie tin.

After scouring my index card box of family recipes, then dog-eared recipe file stuffed with clipped recipes from magazines and newspaper food columns, and finally favorite cookbooks, I was ready to jump into action. The foundation of my work—or my training manual—was Dorie’s Cookies by my friend Dorie Greenspan.  It is the definitive cookie cookbook with recipes which never fail to excite the palate and assuage the desire for new taste sensations.

The game plan for my cookie marathon was carefully strategized. Cookies only from countries I had visited over the years would be considered. The other two criteria included that each cookie had to have a different flavor and a unique shape. Ten cookies were finally selected. The challenge, however, was getting them all baked, packaged, and shipped before they became stale. 

Given UPS’s holiday shipping backlog, I imagine some of the cookies might not be at their best when they arrived at their destination.  However, I consoled myself with knowing than any cookie can be salvaged and sometimes made even more delectable by dunking it into coffee, tea, or milk. That goes for Sherry, Port, Madeira, or Vin Santo, too, for the adults.

Each shipment went out with an inner active note card encouraging recipients to guess the country of origin for each of the cookies.  Let’s see how astute your cookie knowledge is by lining up the country to the cookie. (Hint: Some countries have more than one cookie.)

Cookie

Semolina Almond

Pfefferneusse                                                  

Rugelach                                                          

Sablés                                                                

Speculaas                                                         

Rosemary Pine Nut Biscotti                         

Sugar cookies                                                  

Fudgy Bourbon balls                                      

Toasted almond snowballs

Butti ma buoni

Country of origin

America

Belgium

Germany

Italy

Israel

Morocco

France

Next week, I will supply the answers as well as identify each different cookie in this post’s photo.

While many friends marveled at my getting to the finish line of this crazy, five-day cookie project, there were a few easy techniques employed which facilitated this process. After all, every athlete knows it is all about commitment, understanding the process, and the willingness to putting in the extra time to reach a goal.

TIP #1

Most of the recipes could be made in advance and either refrigerated or frozen for several days. This meant I could gang up three or four recipes at a time and bake them in succession on the same day.  As the cooking temperature for most of these cookies was same 350 ⁰ F, this made the assembly line method straightforward.

TIP #2

Another time saver was using a small ice cream scoop for forming equally sized cookies. The trick here is to use a level, not a rounded, scoopful of dough.

TIP #3

Several years ago, when Dorie Greenspan introduced her cookie book, she revealed a secret technique of adding all the dry ingredients at once. As this is normally a three-part process, Dorie’s method was a tremendous time saver for my cookie making marathon. Here is how she explains it: “When you are ready to add the dry ingredients to the cookie dough (or batter) —a step that usually comes at the end of the process—turn the mixer off, add the flour all at once, and pulse the mixer on and off until the risk of flying flour has passed. Then, once the flour is in, mix on low until it disappears into the dough or is incorporated. Don’t mix any longer – there’s no need, and more mixing will just overwork the dough.”

TIP #4

Another effective take-away from Dorie’s book is to rotate your baking sheets midway through the process.  Given most ovens have hot spots, this evens out the problem allowing the cookies to bake more evenly.

My hands-down favorite recipe from my Christmas cookie marathon is featured in this week’s Dessert Section. See if you can guess which one was chosen.

Before signing off, I have a request to make of you.  I am collecting ideas about interesting food trends for the new year. If you’ve noticed anything meaningful which may have the potential of seriously changing how and what we eat, please email it to me at marsha.palanci@gmail.com.  As CNN’s Dr. Sanja Gupta always concludes his podcast, “I just may include it.”