When a recipe requires four sticks of butter and five cups of almonds, can there possibly be a downside? No. Charlotte Midthun of Granite Falls encountered this recipe in First for Women magazine and had a hunch it would be a hit. “I took these to a party, and everyone loved them,” she said. “I’ve been making them ever since. They’re such a nice contrast to all the chocolate cookies and sugar cookies at Christmas.” They sure are.
The final version of the cookies has a very special mix of sweet, salty, buttery, crunchy, chewy, and earthy. Taste for yourself.
These cookies most resemble Italian baci di dama (recipe, page 120) in appearance, and their diminutive size is part of the appeal. You can, of course, fill them with dulce de leche, chocolate-hazelnut spread, or any other fruit jam, but the softness and florality of the classic guava paste works wonderfully to contrast with the crunchy, buttery cookies.
We’ve put this recipe here because, unlike the pot pies in the first chapter, this is a traditional pot pie with a bottom crust and a top crust, making it a double-crusted pie. This pot pie uses the carcass of the holiday bird to make a rich turkey stock. Making stock is a very flexible process, so use common sense rather than precise measurements. Of course it’s fine to use store-bought turkey stock, but homemade is so much better and takes less than 10 minutes of active time. It’s well worth the small effort, since the turkey is abundance itself and shouldn’t be wasted.
Gujaratis love a good handheld snack. Muddy buddies, or puppy chow, is the kind of snack you can grab a fistful of and throw into your mouth while on the move! Traditionally muddy buddies use peanut butter, but I substitute it with pistachio butter and add a healthy dose of cardamom to really make it sing. They are insanely addictive with their salty, sweet combo, making them the perfect party snack!
Spätzle batter is simple, made of just flour, eggs and milk or water, plain or sparkling, which issupposed to help achieve a light and chewy texture of the noodles.
The classic tagliatelle with Bolognese sauce gets a wafu kakushiaji (“secret umami enhancer”)—sake, miso, mirin, and kombu dashi. For an even deeper layer of umami, make this sauce with chicken dashi or chintan dashi. What’s not to love? Serve this sauce over traditional pasta or udon noodles, or use it to make a wafu-ed lasagna
This cake is a showstopper, and a perfect ice cream treat to serve around the holidays. There is much room for interpretation, however, and any of the No-Churn Ice Cream flavors (below) can be swapped in for everyday afternoon ice cream cake snacking. (I particularly like replacing the pumpkin with the coffee-flavored ice cream.)
For me, this is not just a soup, but also a quick dinner when I add some quinoa or rice to it. This soup is mild, but when I make it for myself, I add hot sauce or green chillies while blending the onions and garlic. You can also add leftover vegetables to it.
A Basque cheesecake is traditionally served crustless and with no berry adornments, but I promise you’re going to fall in love with this rebellious version. I layer it with a cookie crust; I really like the spice in the Speculoos (Biscoff-ish) cookie and bright berries, which just make the mahogany top and lusciously smooth texture sing. You’ll notice the ingredients— like the cream cheese— are cold rather than at room temperature, so it won’t overbake in the hot oven as the top browns.