Cookbook Review: All-Butter, Cream-Filled, Sugar-Packed Baking Book

Who can resist picking up and perusing a book entitled "The Rosie's Bakery All-Butter, Cream-Filled, Sugar-Packed Baking Book"?  Not me, and since its the baking season, bring it on.  There are 17 chapters with over 250 recipes in this tome and every single one looks delicious; however, these are not for the faint of heart. Along with solid advice on cakes, cookies, bars, pies, and puddings, author Julie Rosenberg also classifies cookie types exactly as they should be - just check out these chapter titles: Chewy Crunchy, Crispy Chompy, Cakey Cookies, Sandwiched Together.

My perusal resulted in a desire to hop on a plane to head to Boston to visit her bakery in person.

Since I don't have that opportunity, I am going to start baking from this book today. First up - Ginger Shortbread from her Crispy Chompy chapter. After the initial crispy chomp, I expect a melt-in-the-mouth experience coupled with a pungent sweetness from the two kinds (!) of ginger. My expectations were right on. One thing to note, if you can find baker's cut crystallized ginger about 3mm size, this will make the recipe even easier since you won't have to chop the cyrstallized ginger, which can be tedious since it always wants to stick to the knife. One thing I might do post-baking is to dip them in chocolate - who wouldn't love that?

Here is the recipe:

Ginger Shortbread

Ingredients

• 2 cups plus 2 tablespoons 
all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 sticks (8 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 2/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon 
(lightly packed) light brown sugar
• 3/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 3 tablespoons ground ginger
• 1 cup coarsely chopped candied ginger

Preparation

• Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt together into a small bowl and set aside.
• Cream the butter, brown sugar, vanilla, and ground ginger together in a medium-size mixing bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Stop the mixer once or twice to scrape the bowl with a rubber spatula.
• Add the flour mixture and mix on low speed until the mixture is fluffy again, about 
45 seconds. Scrape the bowl.
• Remove the dough from the bowl and place it on a work surface. Work the candied ginger into the dough with your hands.
• Divide the dough in half. Place two 16-inch lengths of waxed paper or plastic wrap on a work surface. Shape each half of the dough into a rough log about 10 inches long and 1K inches in diameter, and place it along one long side of the paper. Roll the log up in the paper and twist the ends like a hard-candy wrapper.
• Refrigerate the log for 1 to 2 hours.
• Remove the dough from the refrigerator. Using your hands, gently roll the wrapped dough back and forth on the work surface to smooth out the logs. Refrigerate again for 4 to 6 hours.
• Fifteen minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 350°F. Line several baking sheets with parchment paper.
• Remove the dough from the refrigerator, unwrap the logs, and cut them into slices that are a generous L inch thick. Place the cookies 1 inch apart on the prepared baking sheets. Bake the cookies until they are golden and firm to the touch, 28 to 30 minutes. Let them cool on the baking sheets.

Makes 60 cookies

It's the holidays - if you need new inspiration for your holiday baking - pick up a copy.  Go ahead, give yourself an early Christmas present!

The Rosie’s Bakery All-Butter, Cream-Filled, Sugar-Packed Baking Book (Workman Publishing; December 2011).