marshmallow dreams

This weekend marked the first real winter holiday weekend in New York. Following the much anticipated Rockefeller Center tree-lighting, the city erupts in holiday cheer. Holiday markets pop up in Union Square and Columbus Circle, Christmas tree dealers are on every other street corner and the scent of fresh-cut pine lingers all over the Upper West Side. Starbucks' red holiday cups warm chilly hands, snowflake lights go up on Columbus, and tourists swarm midtown hoping for glimpses of Rockettes, 5th Avenue windows, and the skating rink at Bryant Park. It's always my absolute favorite season in the city - we even had our first snowfall this weekend.

But even after a full afternoon/evening of Christmas cookie baking with my friend Emily on Saturday (more on that next post) and a festive holiday party tonight, I'm not there. And I'm haaaating that. I've done all the right things: I set up a Manhattan apartment-sized tree, put lights in my windows, hung my stocking from the mantle and bought holiday cards to mail to everyone I know. I downloaded The Hotel Cafe "Winter Songs" album and watched "Love Actually" and "White Christmas." I even planned the menu for a holiday party I'm hosting this week (all homemade and complete with favors!) but not even impending party hosting has me dreaming of sugarplums and candy canes quite yet.

When I was a kid, I figured the reason I loved Christmas so much was due entirely to the fact that it was the bonus holiday during my birthday month. My brother and I would count down the days on our advent calendars and when the mouse stopped at December 20th it was like Christmas came early. The celebration 5 days later was just an extension of my birthday filled with more gifts, stockings, and a Honeybaked Ham.

However, since life no longer revolves around my Santa list, I've thought a lot about what makes Christmas so special. It's not so much the gingerbread men and cinnamon stick candles and mistletoe and fires in the fireplace and mulled cider and twinkle lights and pine needles in the carpet and hot chocolate and ice skating and cold nights and warm quilts. Christmas is a feeling - in one word, Christmas is cozy. It's all of the things above wrapped up in a blanket and snuggled warm and breathed in. And not much can top it.

But for whatever reason, in the midst of holiday parties, temperatures dropping and holiday cards arriving daily, I'm just not feeling it. And I'm desperate for the coziness to begin. So the baking will continue this week as I go down my list of must-make Christmas cookies in an attempt to pull in some Christmas. I'll keep ya posted (literally).

In the meantime, here's a recipe I made for tonight's holiday party that's insanely easy to throw together and a total crowd pleaser despite its simplicity. Since eating S'Mores is pretty much one of my most favorite things to do of all time (Cut to: Every summer from '01-'03 roasting marshmallows at Camp Seafarer on sticks above our charcoal grill. Cut to: Summer 2004 roasting marshmallows on kebab skewers above the grill on the porch of my beach house during a torrential downpour. Cut to: Summer 2009 roasting marshmallows on chopsticks above my gas burners for National S'Mores Day), it was my delight when a colleague made "Indoor S'Mores" for our office Halloween party.

I could hardly stop stuffing my face long enough to ask her between bites for the recipe but I'm glad I did. With little more than an hour before the party started today I decided to whip up a batch as an extra sweet.

Let me put it this way - there weren't any left at the end of the night. Gooey and chewy and milk chocolatey and YUM. The Indoor S'More is the new Rice Crispy Treat.

Outside of the kitchen, if you have any suggestions for cranking up that holiday feeling, send them my way. I'm on a mission to warm my heart with Christmas cozy.

Indoor S'Mores

Courtesy of one of the Business Office gals

8 cups Golden Grahams cereal (one 13 oz box)

1 1/2 cups Nestle Toll House milk chocolate chips

6 cups miniature marshmallows (one 10 oz bag)

5 tbsp. butter

1 tbsp. vanilla

1/4 cup light corn syrup

Butter a 13 x 9 x 2 inch pan.

Melt 5 cups marshmallows (save 1 cup for later), chocolate chips, butter, and corn syrup in a 3-quart saucepan over low heat, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat. Stir in vanilla.

Pour cereal into a large bowl. Pour mashmallow mixture over cereal, stir until evenly coated. Stir in remaining marshmallows.

Press mixture into pan with buttered back of spoon. Cool until as firm as you'd like (I put the pan in the fridge for 25 minutes and they cut perfectly). Cut into 24 bars. Store loosely covered at room temperature.

play money

Each winter as the holidays near it becomes abundantly clear to that in the wake of the year's promotions and raises I'm left with very little "money." "Money" is the stuff that you can spend on Frye equestrian boots, Marc Jacobs handbags, dinner at The River Cafe, KitchenAid standing mixers and every attachment there is (yes, even the sausage one), haircuts at Frederic Fekkai, gold charms from Helen Ficalora, oh - and holiday presents for your family and friends. The rest of the greenstuff (rent, electric, cable, food, dog walks... baking supplies) doesn't even last long enough to be earn the name "money" before it jumps out of my wallet faster than Edward Cullen with a werewolf on his tail. So I don't count that.

When I first moved to New York City, I made $32,000, had a roommate, $0 debt, didn't know who Rebecca Minkoff was and thought at $5 a pop my beloved Starbucks grande vanilla latte's were luxury. An addict herself (and knowing I couldn't afford it), my Mom enabled my frothy addiction with Starbucks gift cards tucked inside every Hallmark holiday card you can imagine.

Three jobs, a handful of raises, and several pricey handbags later, I live alone, am in debt, and would rather endure swine flu than pay another bill. Ok, ok, I'm hardly walking the line between streets and shelter, but things in this closet-kitchen apartment are just as tight as most Manhattanites I know. It's a financial strain that friends "back home" who are buying wedding gowns, houses, cars, dogs, and onesies can't understand - and I don't blame them. Manhattan living is only justifiable to those of us out of our minds enough to live here.

But, after a year of hearing how those my age are living in various parts of the country (laundry machines! dining room tables! dishwashers!) I've decided the time has come to stop living New York City "beyond my means" as Suze Orman would say.

The first step is admitting I have a problem - and cutting back on the latte's to only what my coveted gift cards can provide. With that comes removing another favorite Starbucks treat - their chewy ginger molasses cookie. It's a rare splurge, but at $2.50/each it's a line item that's been nixed from the new budget.

So, after a few weeks of drip coffee sans-cookie, I found a recipe and had to give it a shot. Ummm... I could walk into my corner Starbucks with a batch of these right now and make a solid $100 under the Starbucks cookie guise - they're THAT GOOD! They've got crunchy outer rims and soft centers just like the 'bucks, and totally satiated my gingery craving. And they're PRETTY! Perfect to box up with a ribbon for spiced holiday gifts.

I won't stop my monthly trips to the mailbox with fingers crossed for the Hallmark logo, but at least I can happily re-create the $2.50 snack in my very own kitchen-closet while firming my financial future.

Molasses Crinkles

Gourmet

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

2 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp ground cinnamon

3/4 tsp. ground ginger

1/2 tsp. ground allspice

1/2 tsp. ground cloves

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2 cup vegetable shortening (at room temperature)

1/2 stick unsalted butter, softened

1 cup packed dark brown sugar

1 large egg

1/2 cup molasses (not robust or black strap)

About 1/3 cup sanding sugar

Whisk together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, allspice, cloves and salt in a bowl until combined.

Beat together shortening, butter, and brown sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes in a stand mixer with a paddle attachment. Add egg and molasses, beating until combined. Reduce speed to low, then mix in flour mixture until combined.

Put oven racks in upper and lower thirds of oven and preheat to 375 F.

Roll 1 heaping teaspoon of dough into a 1-inch ball with wet hands, then dip 1 end of ball in sanding sugar. Make more cookies in the same manner, arranging them, sugared side up, 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets.

Bake cookies, switching position of sheets halfway through baking, until undersides are golden brown, 10 to 12 minutes total, then cool on sheets. Transfer to racks to cool completely.

sweet holiday

I used to haaaate Thanksgiving when I was a kid. It was all food and football and lounging and there was nothing for a kid to do but watch the adults wear a path in the carpet from the kitchen to the couch. Luckily for my sanity (not my waistline), I grew up to discover what Thanksgiving is really about. It's not about the stuffing or the football - it's about family, free-time, and guiltless eating, three things that average adults don't get enough of. And now that I'm nearly 28 living a city girl's life, those three things are like pieces of heaven.

In the midst of that busy city girl life, it sometimes takes being surrounded by blessings to realize the ones you're missing. My grandmother passed away from leukemia last spring, and even though we rarely spent Thanksgiving together, I missed her in the kitchen this past week.

Among other things, she was a High School Home Economics teacher when my Mom was growing up and what stuck out in memory this week was her hands. Her small hands were always getting into something... shelling shrimp at the beach house, working in her award winning flower garden, or putting stray hairs into place before church on Sunday. She was an incredibly strong woman, and superstitious as it might sound I'm convinced she's still around - and am hoping she's finding some pride in my late-discovered baking passion.

I had 5 heavenly days at home last week and I made a Thanksgiving dessert as a nod to my grandmother's southern roots. I rounded up some Georgia pecans (pronounced P-CANS) that my Mom picked up last time she was down south and set to making our entire house smell like a maple sugar factory. It worked. This pie is DELICIOUS. I cooled it completely and it cut into pretty wedges. The pecans were toasted and the sugary filling was amazing.

I miss my grandmother a lot, and cancer really sucks (I know that is a ridiculous understatement, but nothing can describe the horror of it). So, here's giving thanks to the beautiful woman who taught me not only how to bread a catfish, but how to be confident in myself - and find the strength to truly miss her. And of course, many thanks for my incredible friends and family, near and far, who make my life worth living every day (and graciously accept the baked goods I force upon them on a semi-regular basis).

Hope you all had a wonderful holiday filled with family and good food :)

Maple Pecan Pie

Bon Appetit

3/4 cup pure maple sugar

3/4 cup (packed) golden brown sugar

1/2 cup light corn syrup

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter

Pie crust (like this one)

3 large eggs

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1/4 tsp. salt

1 1/2 cups pecan halves

Stir syrup, brown sugar, corn syrup and butter in medium saucepan over medium heat until sugar dissolves and butter melts. Increase heat and boil 1 minute. Cool to lukewarm, about 45 minutes.

Position rack in bottom third of oven and preheat to 350 F. Roll out crust dough on lightly floured surface to 13-inch round. Transfer to 9-inch diameter glass pie dish. Trim dough overhang to 1 inch. Fold edge under, forming high-standing rim; crimp decoratively. Freeze until firm, about 20 minutes.

Whisk eggs, vanilla and salt in 4-cup measuring cup to blend. Gradually whisk maple syrup mixture into egg mixture. Stir in pecan halves.

Pour filling into crust. Bake pie until filling is slightly puffed around edges and center is set, about 55 minutes. Cool pie completely on rack. Cut pie into wedges and serve.

hold the whiz

Continuing the recent "away for the weekend" pattern, I found myself across another bridge (the Benjamin Franklin Bridge) to Philadelphia this weekend to run the half-marathon. It was my second Philly half and third Philly race (I did the full marathon years ago) and it continues to be one of my favorites in the country. I haven't traveled for many "destination" runs (New Year's resolution '10 to fix that) but true to the slogan "the city of brotherly love," Philly welcomes race participants with arms wide each year. We got lucky with perfect weather, and after a successful finish, two free massages, and a wash-the-salt-off shower at the Ritz Carlton, my friend and I gobbled chicken cheesesteaks (without whiz, but equally delish) and hit the road back to New York.

A couple things to note about the NJ turnpike/I-95:

1. Drivers are crazy, fast, and treat the 'pike like a NASCAR video game course

2. New Jerseyans who stop at rest stops have death wishes and will ALL walk in front of your car to test your reaction time

3. There are no logical signs to get you to where you want to go, so you'll probably have to use one of the inconvenient "u-turns" to get back on track

4. The Lincoln Tunnel helix sucks. Period.

In fact, I was so stressed out from driving when I got back to my FREEZING COLD apartment that there was only one logical answer: I had to bake... to warm my place, of course.

And what sounded like a good stress reliever? A comfort sweet.

So I poked around my near-empty fridge and then unpacked my race gear only to find the banana that the Ritz gave to us in a "marathon goodie bag" (so posh of them) when we checked in on Saturday. Armed with the race souvenir fruit and a hankering, I found a Martha Stewart recipe that has answered all of my single-banana moments for the future (and yes, they happen often).

Martha says that this recipe marries two classics, but I'm going to go ahead and say that if a banana bread knocked up a chocolate chip cookie, out would pop these little suckers. Boy, are they tasty! Soft and chewy on the inside, firm enough on the outside to form little cookie pillows of banana/chocolate/oat goodness.

Now if only I'd done the full marathon to justify eating the whole batch ;)

Banana-Walnut Chocolate Chunk Cookies

Martha Stewart Living

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 cup whole-wheat flour (I used all-purpose)

1 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. baking soda

3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup packed light-brown sugar (I used dark-brown)

1 large egg

1 1/2 tsp. pure vanilla extract

1/2 cup mashed ripe banana (about 1 large)

1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats

8 oz. semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped (I used 1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips, chopped in a blender)

1/2 cup coarsely chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 375 F. Whisk together flours, salt, and baking soda in a small bowl; set aside. Put butter and sugars into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy. Reduce speed to low Add egg and vanilla; mix until combined. Mix in banana. Add flour mixture; mix until just combined. Stir in oats, chocolate chunks, and walnuts.

Using a 1 1/2-inch ice cream scoop, drop dough onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper, spacing about 2 inches apart. Bake cookies, rotating sheets halfway through, until golden brown and just set, 12-13 minutes. Let cool on sheets on wire racks 5 minutes. Transfer cookies to wire racks; let cool completely. Cookies can be stored in airtight containers for up to 2 days.