Sugar Cookie Star Tree Tower

 This is from the President's Choice Star Cookie Tower Baking Kit.

Sugar Cookie Dough

5 cups AP flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1.5 cups butter, softened

2 cups white sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla

Whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt in a large bowl. In a separate large bowl, beat the butter and sugar together using an electric hand mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy, for about 3 minutes. Beat in the eggs and vanilla, scraping down the bowl as needed.

Add one-third of the flour mixture to the butter mixture, beat together on low speed until just combined. Repeat with half of the remaining flour mixture, then beat in the remaining flour mixture. Use your hands to bring the dough together; divide and shape the dough into 4 discs. Wrap in plastic wrap; refrigerate until firm, for about 1 hour, or overnight.

Preheat oven to 350F. Working in batches, allow the sugar cookie dough to soften at room temperature for 10 minutes before rolling. TIP: Remove only what you'll need to bake 1 sheet of cookies, keeping the remaining dough in the fridge until needed.

Roll out the dough between 2 sheets of parchment paper to a thickness of 1/4-inch.

Cut out 23 stars total, re-rolling the scraps once. 3 stars each of sizes 1 through 7, and 2 stars of size 8 (the smallest size). TIP: Dip the cookie cutters in flour before cutting to prevent sticking.

Group similar-sized cookies together on parchment paper-lined baking sheets, leaving 1 inch beween each cookie. Refrigerate for 20 minutes. TIP: For faster assembly, use multiple baking sheets to chill and bake the cookies.

Bake, 1 sheet at a time on the middle rack until the bottoms and edges are pale golden, for about 12 minutes for smaller cookies and 18 to 20 minutes for larger cookies. Allow to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes; transfer to a rack to cool completely.

Royal Icing

1/4 cup egg whites (about two)

1 tsp fresh lemon juice

1/4 tsp vanilla

2.5 cups icing sugar

Beat the egg whites, lemon juice and vanilla together in large bowl using an electric hand mixture on medium speed until frothy.

Add the icing sugar; beat on low speed until just combined, then increase the speed to medium-high and beat until thick and smooth. Add food colouring if desired.

Transfer the royal icing to a piping bag fitted with a medium plain tip (or a zip-top bag with 1 corner snipped off). Decorate the cookies with icing as desired. Allow to dry completely.

Pipe icing on underside of 1 of the smallest cookies (size 8); sandwich together with the remaining smallest cookie to make the star-topper. Allow to dry completely, standing upright to dry.

Pipe a dollop of icing onto the center of a plae or platter. Place 1 of the largest cookies (size 1) onto the platter pressing gently to ensure that it sticks; pipe a dollop of icing into the center of that cookie and attach 1 more of the largest cookies, staggering the points so that the stars are not directly stacked on the top of each other (similar to the "boughs" of a tree). Repeat with the reamining cookies and icing, working from the largest cookies to the secon-smallest cookies (sizes 1 through 7).

Attach the star topper, upright, to the top of the cookie tower using icing. Allow to dry completely.

TIP: You may have leftover cookie dough and icing, but since when is that a bad thing? Use it to make and decorate extra cookies.

Starchies

Another entry in this Baking Yesteryear adventure lol. This time I made starchies. An interesting concept... I was anticipating something like a shortbread cookie. But I was definitely wrong.

Here is the recipe:
1/2 cup (120ml) sweetened condensed milk

1/2 cup (115g) butter, softened

2 cups (256g) cornstarch

1. Preheat the oven to 325F (165C)

2. In a large bowl,  combine the sweetened condensed milk and the butter. Beat smooth.

3. Using the handle of a wooden spoon, stir in the cornstarch two tablespoons at a time. Mix until a smooth dough is formed.

4. Divide by rounded teaspoon or small cookie scoop, lightly rolling in the hands to form a smoth 2-inch (5-cm) ball. Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet.

5. Bake for 15-20 minutes. Cookies should not brown. Let cool briefly on the baking sheet before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

I ended up making a x2.5 recipe because I didn't want to have leftover sweetened condensed milk. And doing a x2.5 used up the whole can, and I ended up with 30 cookies. But I wasn't super thrilled with them. The flavour is delicious! But the mouth feel is very very starchy. Hence "starchies" I supposed lol. Z and Adrielle didn't really like them either. I feel like they would have been better just doing the x1 recipe, but still making it into 30 cookies. Maybe even 48. They might be better just being nibbled, rather than having bigger bites from a bigger cookie.

Anyways, here's what they looked like coming out of the oven.

Food for the Gods

Y'all. I don't know if I can accurately describe how amazing this torte is. It's basically a meringue with graham cracker crumbs, raisins, and walnuts. And it is DIVINE!!!!!

White of 3 large eggs

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup (200g) granulated sugar

1/2 cup (60g) fine graham cracker crumbs

1/2 cup (75g) chopped, dried apricot (any dried fruit may be used: dates, figs, currants)

1/2 cup (60g) chopped walnuts

1. Preheat the oven to 325F (165C)

2. Line the bottom of a 9-inch (23cm) springform pan or pie pan with a circle of parchment paper. Lightly grease both the parchment and sides of the pan.

3. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, or in a large bowl with which an electric hand mixer is to be used, beat the egg whites and salt to stiff peaks.

4. Gradually beat in the sugar, 2 tablespoons at a time, until stiff and glossy.

5. Gradually fold in the graham cracker crumbs, then fold in the dried fruit and walnuts.

6. Turn into the pan, smooth the top, and bake for 35 to 40 minutes. The top should be a pale gold colour when done.

7. With the pan remaining in the oven, turn the oven off and leave the door ajar for 30 minutes to dry the meringue. After which, transfer to a wire rack and cool in the pan for 20 minutes.

8. Once completely cool, free the sides of the pan with a sharp knife and invert onto a serving dish or cutting board. Remove the parchment paper before serving.

Tip from Yesteryear: Use a springform pan if you have one, as it will allow the dessert to come out more easily, without breaking.

Oh my goodness. I'm not one that enjoys a walnut dessert that much, but daaaaang this one really hits that good spot! It came out PERFECT, and it was a beautiful nutty treat with surprisingly nice mouth feel. It was a pretty easy dessert to make too, fairly quick to get it in the oven. I would absolutely make this again, maybe trying different dried fruits and nuts. I do have another recipe to try that needs pecans, and the bag I'll be getting will be plenty more than I need, so perhaps I'll try this out with pecans and dates. Mmmmmmm.......

Cinnamon Buns

 2 tbsp white sugar

1 cup lukewarm water

2 pkg (14g) dry active yeast

Let stand 10 minutes.

1 cup milk

1/2 cup white sugar

1/4 cup butter

1 tsp salt

2 eggs, room temperature

6 cups flour

Boil milk; add sugar, butter, and salt. Add yeast. Add eggs. Beat with mixer. Add 3 cups flour, then cup by cup for last 3 cups. Mix should be sticky. Cover and let rise 1 hour.

Roll out on well-floured surface, spread with lots of butter, cinnamon, and brown sugar. Roll, then cut into 12 even rolls.

Butter 9x13 pans lots. Add brown sugar. Arrange rolls 3x4. Cover and let stand 1 hour.

Bake 375F for 10 minutes, then turn down to 350F for 15-20 minutes.

Take another pan, put on top, and flip.

For 9x9 pan:

1.5 tbsp sugar

3/4 cup warm water

10.5g yeast

3/4 cup milk

3/8 cup sugar

3 tbsp butter

3/4 tsp salt

1.5 eggs

4.5 cups flour

Arrange 3x3

Baking Yesteryear - Pie Crust

I got the cookbook "Baking Yesteryear" by B. Dylan Hollis. I have loved his TikToks - well, YouTube vids I suppose lol but they were brought over from TikTok. I am very excited to try all of the recipes lol.

The other day, Z came grocery shopping with me. Peaches were on sale, so she asked if we could make a peach pie. Heck yes kiddo, I'm down!

So today we got to it! Instead of using my usual crust recipe, I decided to try the one in Baking Yesteryear. Here is what Dylan says about it: 

"There will be pies in this book (I sure hope so) that call for a prepared pastry as part of their recipe. And while I feel that this buttery, flaky pastry deserves the right to be featured multiple times alongside them, its recipe will instead wait for you here with eagerness."

So here is the recipe. 

Single crust for 9-inch pie

1 1/3 cups (185g) all-purpose flour

Pinch of salt

1/2 cup (115g) butter or vegetable shortening, cold and cubed

4-6 tbsp cold water

Double crust for 9-inch pie

2 1/3 cups (325g) all-purpose flour

3/4 tsp salt

1 cup (225g) butter or vegetable shortening, cold and cubed

6-8 tbsp cold water

There is a whole method of doing this in the book, but I only half followed it. So here's what I did:

Measure flour and salt into a food processor. Add half the butter, and process until uniform texture. Add the rest of the butter and pulse until crumbly. Add the lower amount of water, and pulse to help bring the dough together. Dough should come together and be sticky, but don't over pulse it. If it's not coming together, add another tbsp of the water. Mine needed 5 tbsp.

Take out dough onto a lightly floured surface, and shape into a flat disc. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill in fridge for at least half an hour. Mine sat for a couple hours while Z and I went to play at the park lol.

Once chilled, roll out dough on floured surface to fit into your pie pan, with enough to slightly hang over the edge. Trim if needed, and crimp the edges with a fork.

If you need to blind bake the shell, preheat the oven to 375°F. Use a fork to poke holes all around the sides and bottom of the crust, so that trapped air doesn't make it bubble up and bake out of shape. Crumple up some parchment paper, then line your pie crust with it and fill with pie weights (or dried beans, which is what I use lol). Bake for 15 minutes, then take out parchment and weights to bake for another 15-20 minutes, until the bottom of the crust is golden brown. Mine took about 20.

That's it! It's pretty easy and quick with a food processor, and this crust is so flaky and delicious! Adrielle loved it even more than my usual crust I make ☺️