mix, mix… stir, stir

Big, thick, chewy, peanutbuttery, chocolaty chunky cookies is what I’m talking about. How could that be anything but good?

photo by David Peterman

The Tuesdays with Dorie group had me making cookies this week. This recipe, which you can find in Dorie Greenspan’s book Baking: From My Home to Yours, brings the three classics of chocolate, oatmeal, and peanut butter, together in a delicious and harmonious way without letting one single ingredient steal the spotlight. I really expected these to be peanut butter cookies with stuff in them, but far from it. It could be that the addition of cinnamon and nutmeg ends up keeping all the star ingredients in check.

Two process discoveries I made: I preferred them cooked a bit crispier than I normally bake cookies, and the dough was better after aging in the fridge for two days. Dorie recommends baking at 350 degrees F and because I usually bake with the convection fan on, which makes the oven a bit hotter, I dropped the temp to 325 degrees F. The second batch I baked at 350 with convection and let them go until I saw the tops just starting to brown, and though they were a bit crispy they weren’t dry. The crunchier bite worked becasue of the peanut butter component in the dough.

photo by David Peterman

The idea of cookie dough benefiting from a 24 to 72 hour rest in the fridge was first brought to my attention by a New York Times article on the perfect chocolate chip cookie. I can’t honestly say that I noticed as dramatic a difference as the article set me up to expect when I tried their recipe and baked batches off at different time intervals, but with this dough I did prefer the extended resting period becasue the oats softened and became more integrated into the baked cookie. The hearty thick cut oats I used were a bit toothsome the first day I baked them. I didn’t intend to test the resting period with this dough, it just worked out that I didn’t have the time to bake the whole batch at once and ended up with a happy discovery.

The NYT article did have a permanent impact on my cookie baking, but because of salt not resting time. A light sprinkle of salt on the cookies before baking delivers a perfect delicately salty counterpoint to the sweetness of the dough and chocolate. Though my choice is flake salt, specifically Murray River Flake Salt over sea salt.

It was fun to bake cookies this week. Thanks to Stefany of Proceed with Caution for the great selection.

Feeling a little lost as to how to start my very first blog post, I turn to one of the most basic and key elements of cooking and have decided to start by adding a little salt.

I recently purchased a beautiful chunk of Himalayan pink salt with the expectation of adding some exotic drama to my cooking by grating salt from this large beautiful rock right into dishes as I cook. I imaged what a beautiful presentation it would make at the table letting guests grate their own salt, fresh off the rock.

Well, salt is really, really, hard and even my beloved Microplane grater wasn’t up to the task. Frustrated that I was only able to create super-fine salt powder and a little turned off by the realization that dinner guests would be putting their hands all over the salt while trying to grate it, I knew I needed a different solution.

Visually this large chunk of salt is stunning and wanted to take advantage of that. In addition, I wanted to actually use it for seasoning because this salt has a wonderful clean delicate flavor. I started to chip off some chunks and crush them into granules when it hit me to turn the rock into a salt celler of salt!

Using the narrowest chisel I could find at the hardware store, I chiseled a well in the center of the rock. After collecting the salt chunks that were chiseled off, I simply crushed them in a mortar and pestle and filled the well with the crushed salt. As I use the salt I can keep chiseling away to create more granules.

A few tips for chiseling:

• Place the salt on a towel up against a wall or solid surface to create resistance and stability while chiseling.
• Cover the whole set-up loosely with plastic wrap to keep the salt pieces from flying all over the room. You will need them to fill the lovely well!
• Safety glasses are a good idea. The salt can really fly and sometimes gets around the plastic wrap.
• Keep turning the salt to work all sides of the well evenly as you chisel. You can sculpt your salt into any shape you like. Salt sculpture could be the next big thing!
• In chiseling the salt try to get large pieces off. This requires some aggressive hammering on the chisel so don’t be shy, though I am sure it is possible to crack the whole chunk in half so start gently and work into it.
• Once you are finished carving your vessel, give it a rinse under running water to restore the shine of the salt. Dry with a towel and you are ready to fill it up.
• After gathering all the salt bits, sift out the fine powder and set that aside for some other use. Crush the larger pieces in a mortar and pestle to a coarseness you like and place it in your new salt celler.

Himalayan Pink Salt rocks available at World Spice.