[Cookie 089] Spiced Almond Wafers

Hey there. I'm still in Ghana. Very much so. It's really starting to set in that I'll be living here for 3.5 more months, which is so strange, but also pretty awesome! You know what goes down after my classes?? Everyone goes to this awesome cafe (if I can even call it that) that is essentially just a few tables and plastic chairs set on the side of the quiet road leading to the NYU Academic Center, and we all get a Star beer (Ghanaian!) and chill out. Uh, YES. Yeah yeah, I can hear my mom and dad groaning all the way across the Atlantic ocean; "Lizzie, do you even do any work there?! What are we paying for!?" Well, I do do work, thank you very much--it's just that Ghanaians really know how to relax. When in Rome/Accra…

Anyway, this is a cookie blog, and not a travel blog! I haven't yet made any cookies here yet, but this weekend it is SO happening, I promise. It has somehow spread around amongst the other students here that I bake cookies often, which is a bad sign because I think there might be a hype that I can't live up to! The pressure!! Anyway, there are a couple recipes that call for ingredients that are super pricy in the states--like Lyle's Golden Syrup--which are very cheap here, but other things are really expensive here, like chocolate. Basically anything imported has a huge price tag, even for American standards, which makes things a little difficult. Nah, actually, I'll just treat grocery shopping like a treasure hunt or something. Eventually I'll find all the cheap flour and sugar! Do you know they have COCONUT FLOUR here?! Awesome!! How do I use it/what do I use it in??

Okay, well this post is actually about another old cookie recipe that I baked right before I flew off to this other side of the globe. Spiced Almond Wafers! Thin, crisp, and spicy--and pretty too. The dough, surprisingly, tasted more spicy before it was baked, which is pretty odd since usually the flavors get enhanced after baking, and after having a day to set in. These cookies ended up tasting nice, but nothing shockingly flavorful or anything. I also wished they were a little thinner, like the pictures, but maybe I just didn't slice the dough thin enough. Oh hey! Idea! Maybe you could use a cooking mandolin to slice the dough evenly! Would that work??

The recipe itself, however, is a little more interesting than most of her recipes. Whipping up the dough is the same as usual, but once you've made it you stick it into some mini bread loaf tins so that the dough freezes into a brick shape. I didn't have any mini loaf pans, so I just used regular sized ones and didn't fill them up bigger than I wanted the dimensions of the cookies to be.

Once you freeze the dough for a while, you slice off cookies and decorate them with almond slices. It can get a little tedious, but if you've got some jams playin' it shouldn't take you too long. And the end result is pretty dang adorable, and I can't deny an adorable cookie. Some people can't deny adorable children--I can! But an adorable cookie, that's another matter.

As you can see, the cookie travels well and is perfect for picnics too! A good snacking cookie, nothing all that heavy or dense, so you can bring them to a party and people won't complain that you're trying to fatten them up (a problem, I must admit, I have encountered a couple of times).

So, in conclusion, these cookies are cute and people will like the way they look and most will like the way they taste. They will probably fall in the middle of my rankings of best cookies, but they ain't bad!

Ciao puppies

xx

Spiced Almond Wafers

Makes about 6 dozen (it's true!!)

Ingredients

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature

1 1/2 cups packed dark-brown sugar

2 large eggs

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 cup sliced blanched almonds

Directions

Line 2 mini loaf pans with plastic wrap.

Whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt. Beat butter and sugar with a mixer on medium speed for 4 minutes. Reduce speed to low. Add eggs and spices. Beat in flour mixture in 3 additions.

Press cookie dough into pans, and cover tightly with plastic wrap. Freeze for 1 1/2 hours (or up to 1 month).

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Remove dough from 1 pan. Let soften slightly. Cut eight 1/8-inch-thick slices with a sharp knife. Cover remaining dough, and freeze in pan until ready to slice and bake.

Place slices 1 1/2 inches apart on a cookie sheet lined with a nonstick baking mat. Top each with 2 to 3 almond slices. Freeze until firm, 5 minutes. Bake until dark golden brown, 10 minutes. Let cool on sheet on a wire rack. Repeat.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 3.5/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 4/5
Tastiness: 3/5
Attractiveness: 4/5
Is it worth it?: Yeah sure, why not

{Pairings}

Drink: Aw, a nice light wine, if you wanna get fancy romantic.

Song: Skinny Love -- Bon Iver
Activity: A picnic, complete with cherries, a baguette, and kettle corn. And that wine. Trust me when I say that can't be beat...

[Cookie 087] Chocolate-Ginger Leaves and Acorns

Well, well, I ain't gone yet. Technically I am, but at the very moment I'm enjoying a relaxing, peaceful stay at the JFK airport...for eight hours. Eight hour layover. I love traveling. Turns out that the student-discount website that I bought my tickets from neglected to inform me that my flight number was changed to a flight leaving an hour later than I had expected, thus giving me eight hours to hang out in the airport. If I had known sooner, I would have taken a later flight to JFK from LAX, and not had to wake up at 3:30 in the morning, but that wouldn't have been any fun now would it?

Okay, okay, it's not so bad. It could be going the other way--me missing my flight by eight hours. And hell, I'm going to AFRICA so I guess I shouldn't really be complaining. I'm doing what I can to pass the time (I bought wifi access for the day, which is how I'm writing this duhhh), and I ate at one of those ridiculous sit-down "restaurants" in the airport, the food at which was thoroughly mediocre. Maybe after this I'll watch some episodes of The Daily Show or Community, or work on my portfolio website. Oh the things I can get done! All while sitting in this vomit-colored leather chair by a window overlooking a massive jumbo British Airways jet. Productivity AND ambiance!

So let's talk about these cookies that I made like 6 weeks ago (whoops, lazy blogging--I couldn't care less). These Chocolate-Ginger Leaves and Acorns really didn't seem like the right cookie to make in July, but I had the ingredients hangin' around--minus the molasses, which warranted a quick trip to Pavilions. The recipe is very simple, even for this cookbook, and satisfied my urge to bake something. However, the resultant cookie wasn't really anything to write home about. It tastes nice, but nothing unusual. And as you can see, I didn't really feel like going out and buying leaf- and acorn-shaped cookie cutters, so I made cats, hearts, and misshapen free-form circle things!

I bet I'm not alone when I say I hate rerolling scraps of dough a million times for cookie-cutter recipes, right? So after a while I either just give up and eat the rest of the dough (NO SHAME!!!) or I roll the dough into balls and flatten them with a fork. Yeah, yeah, they don't cook the same way as the thin cookie-cutter cookies, but this way I get a few under-baked ones, which I love. Everyone's happy, especially me.

So, I guess that's all I have to say about these. I wish I had some epic, hilarious, and tragic story to tell that's related to making these, just so I could pass some more time here at Gate 6 in Terminal 7, but I don't. I guess it's time for me to start playing Farmville again...kidding!! Sort of.

Chocolate-Ginger Acorns

Makes 4 dozen

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for work surface

1/2 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon coarse salt

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

3/4 cup packed dark-brown sugar

1 large egg

1/2 cup unsulfured molasses

1 tablespoon peeled, grated fresh ginger

Fine sanding sugar, for sprinkling

Directions

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, spices, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in medium bowl.

Put butter and brown sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add egg, molasses, and grated ginger; mix until combined. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture; mix until just combined.

Halve dough; shape into disks. Wrap each disk in plastic; refrigerate until cold, about 1 hour. Working with 1 disk at a time, roll out dough on a lightly floured surface to 1/4-inch thick. (If dough becomes too soft at any time, freeze until firm.) Cut out shapes with 3-inch acorn- or leaf-shaped cookie cutters; space 1 inch apart on baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Refrigerate until firm, about 20 minutes.

Score designs with a paring knife; sprinkle with sanding sugar. Bake, rotating sheets halfway through, until firm, 11 to 13 minutes. Cool on sheets on wire racks. Store cookies in an airtight container at room temperature up to 5 days.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 2/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 4/5
Tastiness: 3.5/5
Attractiveness: 4/5
Is it worth it?: Yeah, I guess. I am thoroughly indifferent about these.

{Pairings}

Drink: Because they are pretty subtle in flavor, I wouldn't drink anything with these, per se.

Song: Who Knows Who Cares -- Local Natives
Activity: I could see serving these at an autumn party--a Harvest Party!! Ooh someone please do that! I'm so sad I'm going to miss fall, my favorite season...but I just don't think the leaves are going to change in Ghana all that much.

[Cookie 050] Iced Hermits

Drumroll, please.

Sound the alarms. Stop the presses.

Hire a couple of flying acrobats and white bengal tigers while you're at it, too. And one or two sword-swallowers wouldn't hurt either (well, maybe for them it would).

Yes--it's here. The big five-oh! 50 cookies! Done! Baked! Eaten! Reviewed! Blogged! Remembered! Honored!

But let's not make this a bragging festival. I'm just excited, that's all. After 50 cookies, I'm even more intent on completing this whole adventure in cookery, and I can't wait to bake all 125 I have left (and now that I've typed out "125" I realize that 50 cookies isn't really that many...uh oh). Anyway, I'm so into this. I can't wait to see how the others turn out.

And another thing. You guys. Readers. Friends, amigos, pals. I think it's pretty swell that you read my blog, I really do. I am continually surprised that people do, in fact--but that's not me fishing for compliments, honest! I love you all! And you've seriously taught me load of new stuff about baking along the way. All your tips and comments make a huge difference, and though I am terrible at responding to them, you better believe that I read each and every one of them, savoring them almost as much as I savored eating the 50th cookie I made from The Book.

I am referring to, of course, these Iced Hermits (how'd ya like that for a seamless transition between topics)! Yeah, I spent a good long while trying to pick out the perfect recipe to celebrate this milestone, and in the end, I have no idea why I chose these. Partly because I wanted to make the Rum Balls but didn't have any rum, and partly because these had peaked my interest. And partly because in my art history class we've been obsessing over Jackson Pollock.

See? Look! It's "Autumn Rhythm"! Ahaha! Okay, sorry for the terrible, awful, art-nerd joke. I remember when I shouted it out after drizzling the delicious icing over the uncut cookies, and my friends seriously died. And not out of laughter--it was more of a cringe-induced death. Terrible.

Anyways, I digress. These cookies actually totally deserve the title of 50th cookie. They are fantastically delicious. Absolutely perfect for fall/winter, easy to make, look great, store well, and taste fantastic (especially after you store them away for a few days--like a hermit!). The ginger-flavor deepens after a day or so, and because of the huge amount of molasses and brown sugar, the cookies stay soft and chewy for a good long while. I bet they'd ship pretty well too, so keep that in mind for the holidays I guess.

So, in conclusion, a toast the 50 down, 125 to go. Cheers!

Iced Hermits

Makes about 3 dozen

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened, plus more for baking sheet
• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 3/4 cup raisins
• 1 cup chopped candied ginger, cut into 1/4-inch pieces
• 1/4 cup unsulfured molasses
• 1 large egg plus 1 large egg yolk
• 1 1/4 cups packed dark-brown sugar
• Pinch of ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon coarse salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
• 1/4 cup packed light-brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons whole milk, plus more if needed
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup sifted confectioners' sugar, plus more if needed

Directions

1. Make bars: Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 10-by-15-inch rimmed baking sheet. Line bottom with parchment paper, and butter parchment; set aside. Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, ground ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, pepper, and cloves in a medium bowl; set aside.
2. Put butter in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on medium speed until smooth. Add sugar; mix until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Mix in egg and yolk, and molasses. Reduce speed to low; gradually mix in flour mixture. Mix in 1/2 cup candied ginger and the raisins.
3. Spread dough evenly onto prepared baking sheet. Bake, rotating sheet halfway through, until firm, 18 to 22 minutes. Let cool completely in baking sheet on a wire rack.
4. Make icing: Put brown sugar, milk, and butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring constantly, until butter has melted and sugar has dissolved. Remove from heat; whisk in vanilla and confectioners sugar. If icing is too thick to drizzle, stir in more milk, a teaspoon at a time. If icing is too thin, stir in more confectioners sugar, a teaspoon at a time. Let cool slightly.
5. Drizzle bars with icing; sprinkle with remaining 1/2 cup candied ginger. Let stand until icing has set, about 15 minutes. Cut into 2-inch squares. Bars can be stored in single layers in airtight containers at room temperature up to 5 days.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 3/5 (Spreading out the dough on the cookie sheet is a little annoying, but just be diligent! It is worth it!)
Ingredient Accessibility: 2.5/5
Tastiness: 5/5 (Yeah, I went there--the big 5 for the big 5-0)
Attractiveness: 4/5
Is it worth it?: Yessir!

{Pairings}
Drink: I bet they would be great with some Chamomile or Rooibos Tea

Song: Back to the Sea -- The Sandwitches
Activity: Celebrating my success.

[Cookie 046] Chewy Molasses Crinkles

Sorry about the absence again, I'm a total flake. Well, actually, I left my USB cable at my friend's house so all of my cookie photos were locked in captivity on my camera. Excuses excuses, I know. Good news is I have a lot to post now, so get ready for me to flood your RSS feeders!

So anyway, a week or so ago it got pretty chilly here in New York--as in, down to the mid-40s during the day. I got very excited at the notion of being able to bake spicey, wintery cookies; the ones that while in the oven make your kitchen smell totally divine and cozy. I don't know if it's just me, but I never want to bake that kind of cookie in the heat of the summer. Usually, I reserve the fruity cookies for the summer, and save all the spice-laden ones for the dead of winter, but maybe that's just because that's what all the recipe books tell you to do. Whatever, enough analyzing. So I jumped right in with this recipe for Chewy Molasses Crinkles, is what I'm trying to say. Bought me some Molasses and got to work.

And I was very happy with the end results. The recipe is dead easy and makes an amazing cookie dough to pick at. I made the terrible mistake of leaving the dough to refrigerate for an entire day, and though this made no effect on the outcome of the cookies, I had substantially less dough than when I had put it in the refrigerator to begin with. Meaning: I have sneaking, savage roommates that have to have their fingers in every pie/cookie dough.

Fortunately, the recipe makes a completely massive amount of cookie dough, so you can either make monster sized cookies (who doesn't love that?) or you can make a million medium sized ones (also excellent) or you can eat a bunch of the dough (even better, but could leave you feeling nauseous). I chose options 2 and 3.

One qualm: They weren't very chewy. Well, if you underbake them, which I did, and eat them within the hour after pulling them out of the oven, they are chewy. But by the next day, they are 100% crunchy. I'm sure you can remedy this, but my roommates and I end up eating cookies so fast that preservation is a total joke.

So, to kick off the cooler months ahead (I am so ready to bust out my ugly Chewbacca winter coat), make these cookies. But if it's still warm where you are, they would make a totally delicious ice-cream sandwich if you put a scoop of vanilla or even ginger ice cream in between two. Now, go!

Chewy Molasses Crinkles

Makes about 2 dozen (but I got about twice that much...)

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup packed light brown sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar, plus 1/4 cup for rolling
• 1/2 cup unsulfured molasses
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon allspice
• 1/2 teaspoon course salt

Directions

1. Put butter, brown sugar, and 1/2 c granulated sugar in bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium speed until smooth, about 3 minutes. Mix in eggs one at a time, followed by the molasses and oil.
2. Reduce speed to low; gradually mix in flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, allspice, and salt. Cover dough with plastic wrap; refrigerate until firm, about 1 hour or overnight.
3. Preheat oven to 325 F. Put remaining 1/4 c granulated sugar in a bowl. Using a 1 3/4 inch ice cream scoop, form balls of dough. Roll balls in sugar to coat, and space 3 inches apart on baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Bake, rotating sheets halfway through, until cookies are flat and centers are set, about 17 minutes. Let cool completely on sheets on wire racks. Cookies can be stored between layers of parchment in airtight containers at room temperature up to 5 days.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 1/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 3.5/5
Tastiness: 3.5/5 (A tad boring to be honest...)
Attractiveness: 3.5/5
Is it worth it?: If you want a molasses cookie, you'll get exactly what you're looking for.

{Pairings}
Drink: Apple cider, maybe? Ginger tea? Milk? Milk Tea? Ginger apple cider milk tea? (That's sounds gross, I apologize...)

Song: Winter is Blue -- Vashti Bunyan
Activity: Something cozy...baking these while wearing your favorite wooly knitted socks?

[Cookie 037] Chocolate-Ginger Brownies

Yesterday, here in lovely Los Angeles, it was 105º F. That's 40.5º C. That's really hot. And to tack onto the scorching temperature, more wildfires have sprung up in the mountains, one of which is located in a town that's only 20 minutes away from my house! It's totally nuts! From anywhere in my town, if you looked north toward the mountains you could see this monumental plume of smoke billowing out of the canyons--it looked like a nebula in outer space it was so huge.

So yesterday evening, as the fires raged and the temperature outside was still in the 80s at 10:00 pm, I went with a friend to see Brüno (which was hilarious, seriously--I had low expectations, but it was so worth it). Anyway, afterward we decided to drive north toward the mountains just a bit so we could get a glimpse at where the fires were coming from. As we came out of a tree-lined residential street and into the open, we could literally see the flames outlining the slope of one of the hills. It looked something like this:

(Picture not my own! Credit: darylphotos' on Flickr)

So yeah, pretty scary. I hope none of you are affected by any of these fires! And if you live nearby, be safe! I could literally watching the flames advancing over the ridge of the mountain with my own eyes--fire spreads fast...like WILDFIRE!

But enough about that. I'm here to bake cookies. Or in this case, Chocolate-Ginger Brownies. I hate to tell you guys, though, that this is another of her mysteriously bad, possibly unedited/unproof-read recipes though. Those who know me know that I'm a totally gingerophile, so I was totally gung-ho about the flavors in this recipe. Unfortunately, the end result was not so good.

I'm pretty sure this recipe must have been just missing an ingredient or two, because I had made one of Martha's brownie recipes, the Double Chocolate Brownies, before and they were fantastic and simple and just a great recipe all around. These, however, did not list any sort of leavener (read: Baking Soda or Powder) in the ingredients, and therefore the brownies did not rise an inch. They were absurdly dense, chewy, and pretty gross.

However, I did enjoy the idea behind this recipe. Maybe it's more of a conceptual recipe--a theoretical brownie. They have ginger, cloves, and all sorts of spices, which when combined with chocolate make a really interesting flavor combination. So I bet if you took her Double Chocolate Brownie recipe and added these spices and flavors, you would have a winner. I urge you to try it if you love ginger like I do!

Here's a photo of my disappointment in the end result (left, sadface) followed by a photo of the next recipe I made immediately after throwing away the theoretical brownies (right, dorkyface):

The next recipe is a winner. Stay tuned folks.

Chocolate-Ginger Brownies

Makes 16 small brownies, or 9 large

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, plus more for baking dish
• 3 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
• 1 cup sugar
• 2/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
• 2 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon grated peeled fresh ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon coarse salt
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter an 8-inch square baking dish. Line bottom with parchment paper, allowing 2 inches to hang over 2 sides. Butter parchment; set aside. Melt butter and chocolate together in a medium saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat, and stir in remaining ingredients.
2. Pour batter into prepared dish. Smooth top with a rubber spatula. Bake until a cake tester inserted into center comes out with moist crumbs, 30 to 35 minutes. Let cool in pan on a wire rack 15 minutes. Lift out, and let cool completely on rack. Cut into sixteen 2-inch squares. Brownies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature up to 4 days.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 2/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 3.5/5 (Just your basic spices...)
Tastiness: 1.5/5 (With potential, though!)
Attractiveness: 3.5/5
Is it worth it?: If you add some baking powder, they might work and be delicious! So be adventurous and try it out for me and let me know, because I am too busy/lazy to try any recipe twice.

{Pairings}
Drink: Milk ... or ice cream (which is not a drink, but really now, is that going to stop you?)

Song: Crimson and Clover -- Lovin' Spoonful
Activity: Something cozy, like watching a movie on a cold night?

[Cookie 001] Pfeffernussen

Preamble: Ok, so here it goes. I am making a four year commitment here. Well, more like 3.5, but we'll say 4 for the sake of sounding even. This is my very first cookie baked as part of my Martha Stewart 4 Year Cookie Experience, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Martha Stewart (get it? bad joke). Anyways, diligently I will plow through her cookbook, trying not to repeat any recipes, until I have made all 150 cookies and treats. Hopefully I will complete this by the time I finish college, which, if I make 1 recipe a week and my calculations are correct, should take me about 3 years total. Better get cookin'...

So February is halfway complete, and if that doesn't blow your mind, I don't know what will. Maybe these cookies? Eh, they're good, but not necessarily mind blowingly good. These Pfeffernussen--"Peppernut" in English--cookies are tasty and delightful, but nothing too remarkable. But really, they are very very tasty, don't get me wrong, but they aren't very different. I recommend you make them, though, because they are tasty and simple! Crowd pleasers too! And the name is so fun to say; plus, it sounds complicated and gourmet and makes you sound like a fancy pastry chef.

The Pfeffernussen in particular were so easy to make and were texturally spectacular! Yes! They had just the right amount of crunchyness on the edges while still maintaining a perfectly soft pillow-like texture in the middle. I also really loved how every so often you could taste a bit of ground black pepper in the cookie; a little bit of spice!

And look how cute they are!! Aw! I just liked looking at them all lined up on the baking sheet like little pyjama buttons. HOWEVER, be forewarned that they are ridiculously messy to eat! Confectioner sugar flies everywhere when you bite into them.

Pfeffernussen
Makes 3 dozen

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 cups confectioners' sugar
• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
• 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 3/4 cup firmly packed light-brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/4 cup unsulfured molasses
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Place the confectioners' sugar in a brown paper bag (I used a tupperware container).
2. In a medium bowl, combine flour, pepper, cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg, cloves, and baking soda. Set aside.
3. Place butter, brown sugar, and molasses in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with paddle attachment. Beat on medium speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Beat in egg and vanilla. With mixer on low speed, add flour mixture; beat until just combined. Pinch off dough in tablespoon amounts; roll into 1 1/4-inch balls. Arrange balls 1 1/2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets. (Dough can be frozen at this point, covered tightly with plastic wrap, up to 1 month.)
4. Bake until cookies are golden and firm to the touch with slight cracking, about 15 minutes, rotating sheets halfway through. Transfer sheets to a wire rack to cool slightly, about 10 minutes. Working in batches, place cookies in paper bag; shake until well coated. Let cool completely on wire rack. Store in an airtight container.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 2/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 4/5
Tastiness: 4/5
Attractiveness: 3/5
Is it worth it?: Yes!