chickens in the burbs

Friday, December 18, 2009

cookie, cookie, cookie starts with "C"

Today has been spent hanging with Cababy as usual and trying to fit in some Christmas cookie baking. Tomorrow morning I have a cookie exchange with some lovely ladies. Whoever came up with cookie exchanges was brilliant. What's better than making one kind of cookie and going home with a whole melange of cookie goodness?! It's a really good thing.

This year I opted for an easy recipe (actually 2 recipes because the cookies are pretty small) that makes a LOT of cookies. Not lazy...just efficient. Oh, and citrus has sounded very good lately and I love how the kitchen smells when any citrus is being prepared.

Margarita Cookies. I'll tell you how they turn out, I substituted Triple Sec for the Tequila because we just didn't have any in the house.

"Key" Lime Meltaways. "Key" because I didn't actually go look for Key limes. I was at our market and they had limes bagged up (5 per bag) for $1 per bag!! I'm sure they'll still be very limey. A couple of years ago my friend Martha brought these to our exchange and I fell in love instantly. I hope some of them actually make it to tomorrow. :)

Can I ask how anyone managed to zest citrus before these babies came on the scene? I love, love, love mine...even though I only zest citrus 3 or 4 times each year (I'd love to use it more often...like for lemon curd and lemon or lime bars...but then I wouldn't be able to fit through the doors in our house). It is worth whatever it cost (I think it was around $9) and the little bit of drawer space that it takes up. Also, for those two recipes (that I doubled) I zested about 10 limes and 1 orange in a flash...so there you go.

Can't wait to actually bake and taste them!!

2 comments:

Santa's helper said...

I'm sure your margarita cookies will be yummy with triple sec, but it might be a stretch to continue to call 'em margarita ... since tequila tastes like pine needles and triple sec is orange flavored.?

MandyPants said...

Well, they still taste pretty margarita-y thanks to LOTS of lime zest and the sugar/salt on the edge. I'll stick with the name. Besides, haven't you ever had a virgin margarita...still tastes like a margarita without the tequila...and I'm pretty sure we have the triple sec because it was a margarita ingredient. So I stand by my substitution. :) They are VERY good. In fact, I think I like them better than the batch of lime meltaways that I made.