Going Rogue

Dish Danielle, Dish Amelia, and Guest Dish Jessie were featured in an Atlantic article about the Whisk & Ladle Supper Club (located conveniently in Danielle and Jessie’s Brooklyn living room). Congratulations, dishes!

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Chocolate Spice Pine Nut Cookies

From Dish Jodi:

I just started a new day job and have been feeling major kitchen guilt. My poor oven’s been neglected for a month and by the time I get home at night after a day of finally fulfilling work, I can’t manage more than some pan-seared chicken breasts and steamed veggies.

I needed some sugar, I needed to bake…but also needed to ease my way back in. So cookies…big hunky rich ones. Wanted to do something beyond just chocolate chip cookies…so spiced them up. I love the creaminess of pine nuts so thought they might be a good counterpoint to the spice. You decide. (Obviously, you can substitute anything you want in lieu of pine nuts and chips…well not ANYTHING…you know what I mean.)

Ingredients:

2 Sticks of Butter
1 Cup Granulated Sugar
1 Cup Brown Sugar
3 Large Eggs
2 tsp Vanilla
3 Cups All-purpose Flour
1/2 Cup Cocoa Powder
1 tsp Baking Soda
1 tsp Cinnamon
1/2 tsp Chile Powder
1/4 tsp All-spice
1/4 tsp Salt
2 Cups Dark Chocolate Chips
3/4 Cup Pine Nuts

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line cookies sheets with parchment.

Toast the pine nuts in a dry saute pan.

Cream butter and sugars in an electric mixer until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time and thoroughly incorporate between each one. Then stir in vanilla.

Sift together in a bowl, the flour, cocoa powder baking soda, salt and spices. Add to the butter mixture until just combined, then add in the nuts and chocolate chips.

Spoon 1/4 cup size balls about 2 inches apart on your baking sheets. Smush them down a bit for flatter, bigger cookies.

Bake for about 14 minutes, cool on sheet for 5 minutes, then transfer to a rack to cool the rest of the way. Best when the chips are still melty.

A surprising chocolate flavor with a little more complexity than you expect. My new colleagues will be so excited when I bring them to the office tomorrow!

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First Communion

From Dish Amelia:

I’ve moved! Moving is a chore and a pain of course, but there are wonderful, meaningful and exciting aspects too. I come from a place where you “smudge” the corners of a new house with fragrant smoke to clean and claim it. I believe that your dreams from the first night of sleep in a new home are important, and I think the first thing you eat in it has some significance, its the first time you commune with those windows and walls, and a deal is struck. As soon as I found my knife, I made this. Its a Waldorf Salad of sorts. And no I did not move to Astoria. I’m cookin in Brooklyn, honey.

A few stalks of celery, chopped
a green apple, chopped
3 scallions, chopped very thin
1 cucumber, peeled and chopped
a handful of walnuts, roughly chopped
a smaller handful of dried currants
1 small container of plain nonfat greek yogurt
S&P
A drizzle of honey
1T of New Mexican dried, ground red chile

Combine ingredients. No, its not technically cooking. Its more of a ritual. The components are fresh, the windows open. Earthy, like lying on your back and staring up at unfamiliar shadows on the night ceiling, hot and cold like the running water and noisy radiators, and healthy, like your new life.

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