I made these cookie cups from David Lebovitz‘s blog when my cousin Anne visited a few weeks ago, and served them with Clotilde’s (of Chocolate & Zucchini) Super Simple Nutella Ice Cream. You can find the recipe for the cookies here; scroll down to find it, as it’s toward the bottom of the post. I’ve always thought tuile cookies like this were so pretty, but figured it’d probably be kind of difficult to get that lacy look right. In fact, it couldn’t be simpler — you just put a dollop of the batter on a piece of parchment and flatten it a little, and it spreads out and becomes lacy while it bakes! Getting them off the pan was slightly more challenging, mostly because I don’t have a metal spatula, so I found it easiest to tear the parchment in pieces so I could pick it up and transfer it directly to the bowls I was using for a mold.

I highly recommend these as they come together in a jiffy, but they make for a very elegant and impressive way to serve dessert. Now, I just have to get my hands on a copy of The Perfect Scoop, David’s ice cream book, for some more ideas on what to fill them with. Check it out, everything looks delicious!

This is my mom’s recipe for pecan toffee, which she thinks came from Better Homes and Gardens several years ago. It’s another one of those things that’s special because we only make it at Christmas. Like the Date Rock Cookies, I’m not putting a picture, but they’re on the platter with the Nutty Fingers on that post.

You might also like:

• Nutty Fingers
• Date Rock Cookies
• Mocha Peppermint Bark Cookies
• Peppermint Bark
• Christmas Cookies

Pecan Toffee

Ingredients:

1 1/2 c chopped pecans, divided
1 c sugar
1 c butter, softened
1/3 c water
5 1.55 ounce milk or dark chocolate bars, chopped into small pieces (I prefer dark. And of course, the better the chocolate you use, the better the toffee)

Special Equipment:

Candy thermometer

Line a 15″x10″ jellyroll pan with heavy duty aluminum foil.l Lightly grease the foil. Sprinkle 1 c of the chopped pecans to within 1″ of the edge.

Bring sugar, butter, and 1/3 c water to a boil in a heavy saucepan over medium heat. Stir constantly about 12 minutes, or until a candy thermometer reads 300 degrees. This is the “hard crack stage.” You can also check this by dropping a few threads of the candy into a glass of ice water to cool. The threads should then crack when you bend them rather than stretching.

Pour over pecans. Quickly sprinkle with chocolate pieces (so they melt). Let stand 30 s. sprinkle with remaining 1/2 c of pecans. Chill 30 minutes (or until hard) and then break up the toffee into bite size pieces. Store in an airtight container.

Matt and I bought a Christmas tree this weekend, and I decorated it last night, so I seem to have gotten in my holiday mood early this year. So of course I wanted to bake something festive. Inspired by an old recipe from Heidi of 101cookbooks, I decided to make some chocolate peppermint bark cookies. Not wanting to pay $20 a pound for peppermint bark, I first had to make my own. Here’s my “recipe”, though you can barely call it that. Next time, I think I’ll change the ratio to have a little more semisweet chocolate than white, and add a few drops of peppermint extract to the white chocolate.

You might also like:

• Nutty Fingers
• Pecan Toffee
• Date Rock Cookies
• Mocha Peppermint Bark Cookies
• Christmas Cookies

Peppermint Bark

Ingredients:
12 oz semisweet chocolate
12 oz white chocolate chips
6 peppermint candy canes or about 25 (I’m guessing) peppermint candies

Instructions:

First line a jelly roll pan with parchment paper.

Melt the semisweet chocolate. I used a double boiler, but mostly just because I wanted to take a picture of something melting that hopefully will eventually be added to the header here. The microwave (on low heat) would work fine too. Spread the melted chocolate in the jelly roll pan. I didn’t want it too thin, so mine just covered about 3/4 of the bottom of the pan. Place in the fridge to harden. I left it in the fridge for about 15 minutes, and it felt hard, but kind of made a mess in the next step, so I’d probably recommend leaving it at least 25 minutes or so, so it can get really cold. It might even be good to put it in the freezer at the end for a couple minutes, though not long enough to really get frozen or the chocolate might get that white film on it that frozen chocolate gets.

While you’re waiting for the semisweet chocolate to harden, crush the candy canes. I didn’t find a great way to do this — they poked holes in my plastic bag when I tried to crush them in a bag, so then I tried the food processor which grated the already small pieces really small but didn’t do much for the big ones. Overall, I think a heavy duty plastic bag is probably the best option, and next time I’ll probably use the smaller peppermint candies instead of candy canes. Then melt the white chocolate. Spread the white chocolate on top of the semisweet chocolate. This is where I got into trouble — the white chocolate melted the semisweet, so they got a little swirled together when I tried to spread it. You can’t really tell with the peppermint pieces on top though, and it doesn’t much matter anyway.

While the white chocolate is still hot, sprinkle the peppermint pieces over the top. I then used a piece of parchment paper to very gently press in the peppermint pieces. Put back in the fridge. When good and hard, break into pieces.

We’ll see tomorrow how the cookies go!