Nutella Almond Cookies
December 30, 2009 | Filed Under Baking | 1 Comment
When I was backpacking around Europe with a friend, we had picked up a small jar of Nutella in Venice, Italy. On a budget and trying to plan out our itinerary a bit on the fly, we had planned to eat it for breakfast with fruit or bread, but our plans never panned out and so we ended up with the roughly 13 oz. glass jar of Nutella as our traveling companion as we traveled through Venice, Rome, Florence, Nice, and Barcelona where we finally gave up on the meal idea and gifted it to a friend of hers we met. Lugging around the jar of Nutella had been a running joke for us… too bad we didn’t take photos of it visiting all the sights.
I had a jar of Nutella and wanted to do something with the tasty hazelnut spread and remembering the delicious and chewy nutella cookies a friend of mine would make every now and then for me, I found a recipe for Nutella Almond Cookies. Before I started baking these cookies, fortunately I had gone to the store to buy another jar because apparently the Nutella I had already had lost its freshness and so I chucked the old one and opened up the new container instead. I was attracted to this recipe because I’m also a fan of almonds. Since I didn’t have a fresh bag of chocolate chips on hand, I omitted them. The almond slivers easily broke apart as I was mixing them in… I also forgot to put them in for the first few cookies. The spacing doesn’t need to be as generous as 4 inches apart with the medium cookie scoop I used and I had also added 1/3 cup of flour to the original recipe as someone else had suggested, but I found they were a little more on the cakey side. Next time, I might try it with 1 1/2 cups flour instead.
Nutella Almond Cookies
(Adapted from recipezaar)
Ingredients:
- 1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 cup butter, softened
- 1/2 cup nutella
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3/4 cup sliced almonds
Directions:
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
- In a medium bowl combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Whisk to incorporate and set aside.
- Using an electric mixer (or manually) in another medium bowl, combine the butter, chocolate hazelnut spread, sugar, and brown sugar and cream the ingredients together, about 4 minutes. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until smooth, about 1 minute.
- Using a wooden spoon or rubber spatula, stir in the flour mixture one-third until just combined. Add the almonds and stir until just combined.
- Using a tablespoon measure or a medium cookie scoop (1 1/2 tablespoon), spoon out the cookie dough onto a cookie sheet (or a silpat), spacing the mounds about 2 inches apart. Bake until lightly golden around the edges, about 8 to 10 minutes. Allow cookies to cool.
I am Not a Foodie, I Just Like Food
December 27, 2009 | Filed Under Baking, Cooking, News, Photography | Leave a Comment
Paul Child: What is it that you really like to do?
Julia Child: Eat!
Paul Child: And you’re so good at it!
(Julie & Julia)
Recently, I was watching an Iron Chef America episode where Giada De Laurentiis and Rachel Ray competed against each other with Bobby Flay and Mario Batali as their respective teammates. What stuck out is how Ray kept saying, “I am not a chef, I’m just a cook.”
Coincidentally, I had recently been thinking about the term “foodie” which has apparently officially made it into mainstream language, at least according to the Oxford English Dictionary and Merriam-Webster and they each have slightly different definitions:
OED: A person with a particular interest in food; a gourmet. (Sometimes distinguished from ‘gourmet’ as implying a broad interest in all aspects of food procurement and preparation.)
MW: A person having an avid interest in the latest food fads.
Something has always bothered me about that term especially when people call themselves foodies as if it were a credential that could be earned when it’s really a self-classification and many times, it seems to be used by someone to give themself more credibility with an air of elitism (According to OED, “1982 V. Woods et al. in Harpers & Queen Aug. 66/4 ‘Foodies are foodist. They dislike and despise all non-foodies.’”); there appears to be a similar conversation around chef vs. cook. I’m curious how many self-proclaimed foodies like cooking (OED) and how many just chase the latest trendy restaurants and just eat (MW)?
I also started wondering when the trend of taking photos of food during meals started to become more popular. When I was getting more into photography, I started taking photos of food because I found it as an interesting subject as still life and good practice for framing, composition, depth of field, and lighting. I used to be the only one taking photos of food I had made and food I had ordered, but now it’s not uncommon to be in the company of many (especially in a group setting frustrating our hungry dining companions who aren’t taking photos and also potentially being disruptive to others). I suppose now that social networking has become a regular part of people’s lives, it’s just natural to visually share what people are experiencing through taste.
Since I started reading Best Food Writing 2009, a birthday gift from a friend of mine, I thought it would be a good opportunity to expand my creative adventures to include food here (and my exploration of food establishments in my travel site).
Be warned that although I’m okay with cooking, I’ve mostly been doing baking and desserts (pictured above are pound cake and mixed berry Zinfandel sorbet I’ve made in the past). I’ve enjoyed the precision of baking and how it’s easy to create a baked treat as long as you have the staples of butter, flour, and eggs (and baking powder and baking soda).
After I had a private cooking party this year for my birthday and after organizing a screening of Julie & Julia followed by a cooking party with friends, I’ve been inspired to expand my culinary repertoire into cooking more. There should be some interesting adventures ahead…