Hungarian Shortbread

At 1:06 in the night from Sunday to Monday, I am writing from my flannel covered duvet with buttery, salty crumbles of Hungarian Shortbread* melting in the back pockets of my mouth. House and village are asleep.

Little toes here, a knee cap over there poking out from underneath the feather duvet to my left; did not hear my little one wander in and climb over me. She is in deep rest now, the peach pit sized bruise on her knee, a badge from the romping, running, twirling and tumbling that is part of the territory for a four year old. Glad she is sleeping well; tomorrow it is back to biscuits as we like to say in this house. The alarm is set. Pfingstferien (Whit holidays break) has come and gone. We had a lovely two weeks in the Oberpfalz region of Bavaria where we live. Just this is what I was thinking at 00:50/12:50am when I illuminated my alarm clock and finally stole a look. I swore it was almost 5:00am. I feel so rested; must have logged some good shut eye already. Not sure how long I lay in thought before checking the clock, a film of the last weeks was playing clearly in my mind: the breath taking Danube aperture, cuckoo calls in the forest, the remains of the Roman fort Abrusia; fields of wild flowers: dandelions, buttercups; sun, swinging, Schwetzi as the local swimming hole is fondly called, table tops covered in yellow pollen dust, fields of more new wild flowers: sweet peas, vetch, wild sage; sheep farm Heller: mounds of natural and dyed wool, Frau Heller´s unfiltered apple juice, orphan lamb baaing to be bottle fed; poppy seed strudel, dancing, twirling, cuddling, rainbow chalk dust driveway; wild garlic pesto**; yet more wildflowers: daisies, chicory, forget-me-nots, poppies; ribwort; pressing flowers, Dicker Mann: Wiener Schnitzel fried in Butterschmalz (heaven), natural history museum, bees, Herzogsgarten: humongous stunning rhododendrons in multitude, old town, Café Opera: almond croissants, DIBA: roasted sesame seed brittle and ginger lemon gelato. As the film recounts adventures great and small, I arrive at the Hungarian Shortbread which I left cooling on the counter when going to bed. At this point, totally awake, I decide to get up to cover the shortbread; not so bad that I woke up other wise it would dry out too much over night. The shortbread is a recipe from the recent “Butter” issue of Saveur magazine. The idea of freezing the shortbread dough and then grating it before baking is genius. Geniality can not wait to be sampled at a proper morning hour. So I cut myself a sliver. Mmm…buttery, light, crumbly, delicious. My taste buds infer a Diavlo espresso would be perfect now; reasoning tells this insomniac to hold off for obvious reasons besides not wanting to clank around too much. Cupboard open, I reach up and grasp a hand blown irregular juice glass and opt for milk. Milk and short bread are good friends. Deciding to cut one more sliver of shortbread, I am inspired to creep back into bed and put some thoughts down. Now having shared a bit, pardon me if I rambled, I will sign off as I feel sleep coming over me again. See you in the coming days when I edit and post this.

*Further comments on the shortbread recipe featured in the Saveur “Butter” (issue #109):

After you combine the ingredients for dough and before freezing, I recommend shaping the dough into two oblong shapes rather than into balls; this shape is easier to hold and grate in my opinion.

For the filling I used a mixed wild berry jam. But when spring and summer move along I would like to try replacing the jam filling with fresh wild blueberries and later wild cranberries.

**I will try to post the wild garlic pesto recipe in the coming days. It is too late to pick wild garlic at the moment as it has flowered and tastes bitter. Perhaps you have some that you have frozen or you can just tuck this recipe away until next spring.

Cookies in Milk

Father Frost revisited us for the duration of Easter break. Knowing that it could not last too long, considering that March is practically over, we enjoyed the view of the whirling snowflakes outside. Books, crafting hands, imaginative play, romping and last but in no way least cooking and baking filled our days. One especially pleasing goody was the simplest of all our baking efforts; it did not get ohs and ahs, rather our slipper clad feet tapped away under the heavy wood table with possibly a drip of milk on our chins. It had been ages since I stirred up a bowl of sour creme cookies. They are understated cookies not attention grabbers; plain with a cakey bite. Consideration: should they be a nutmeg walnut creation, lemon zest and poppy, or chunked with chocolate. Choosing the first two variations, we were pleased to eat them warm fresh out of the oven but they were by far the best the day after we baked them. The next morning we broke them up, put them in a shallow wide tea cup and carefully drizzled milk in…for breakfast. mmm Thick, dense, crater filled sour creme cookie pieces in a wide cup of milk. Spoon not necessarily required.

Having looked through my cookbooks and at on-line recipes, I determined there are no significant variations on the basic dough for sour cream cookies, only that some use baking soda or both baking soda and baking powder. The following recipe is based on the Sour Cream Cookie recipe in my dog eared college copy of “the New York Times Bestseller” Betty Crocker´s Cookbook. I have altered it by adding more vanilla, more nutmeg, include nuts and combine the ingredients slightly differently. The possibilities with this basic cookie dough are broad: make it as spicy, nutty, lemony or chocolaty as you crave.

Sour Cream Cookies

1 cup/250g softened butter

2 cups/400g light brown sugar

3 eggs, gently beaten

2 tsp/10ml vanilla

4 cups/630g sifted flour

2 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp fresh ground nutmeg

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup/250ml sour cream

1.5 cups finely hand chopped walnuts (if using processor careful not to pulverize)

preheat oven to 190°C/350°F

1. cream butter together with sugar until light

2.stir in eggs and vanilla

3. mix dry ingredients in a seperate bowl.

4. alternately add dry ingredients and sour cream to to the butter mixture.

5. fold in walnuts

Place heaping teaspoons of dough on to a lined baking sheet.

Bake until gold, approx. 8 min. in a convection oven, a little bit longer for standard ovens.

Makes 4 to 5 dozen cookies depending on how you heap your teaspoon.

My tips:

-add 1 tsp ground cinnamon and 1/2 tsp ground clove for a spicier taste

-add zest of 2 large lemons and 2 tbsp poppy seed for a brighter taste (and leave out the ground spices)

-jazz cookies up with a walnut or a lemon glaze for the sweeties

Curd Stollen

Having missed posting this recipe for curd/quark* stollen in December, on account of being an industrious wool crafter with Christmas gifts to be made and then playing virus ping pong with one sweet little runny nosed kindergartner in residence, I elect to post the curd stollen recipe some what delayed with a crisp wintery January landscape as a backdrop. For me stollen is not synonymous with Christmas rather with winter. Meaty nuts, sweet muscular dried fruit baked into a loaf mean winter comfort anytime from December to February. I prefer dried chopped cherries, apricots and or figs. Chopped walnuts and hazelnuts are always pleasing, pistachios can be used to brighten up the loaf and I adore pecans which for my taste buds bring a round maple flavor to whatever they are added to. Being that this is a curd stollen it does not need to age to get better. You can bake it and eat it while it is still warm. My special tip for breakfast and tea time: toast it and slather with butter. N.B.: stay close to the toaster to make sure the fruit does not burn. The recipe is based on one that was on my cake mold box ( Kaiser Stollenbackhaube) when I bought it but I have made enough changes to claim this recipe as my own.

* www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quark_%28food%29

Curd Stollen Loaf (Quarkstollen)

500 g/ 3.5 cups flour

15 g/ 1 tbsp + 1.5 tsp baking powder

200 g sugar

15 ml/1 tbsp vanilla

1 pinch salt

50ml/1/4 cup Nocello (walnut liqueur)

2 eggs

175 g/6 ounces or 12 tbsp cold butter

250 g/ 1/2 cup curd

100 g/3.5 ounces marzipan

150 g/ 1 cup chopped dried cherries

150 g/ 1 cup chopped dried apricots

100 g/ 1 cup walnuts

50 g/ 1/2 cup hazelnuts

50 g/ 1/2 cup pecans

Sift and mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl. In a separate small bowl gently beat sugar, eggs, salt, Nocello then add to dry ingredients and mix with a wooden spoon. Add butter in pieces, curd, dried fruit and nuts. Knead well with hands.

Press the dough into a buttered stollen mold (mine is 39.5cm long/about 15.5 inches), a long loaf pan or two normal sized. If using a stollen mold, butter a baking sheet as well and then place the mold open side down on the sheet.

Bake at 160° C convection oven or 180° normal for approx. 60 min. or until knife comes out clean.