As fantasies go, this one of mine is pretty tame stuff.
It’s cold and rainy outside. I’m in my kitchen surrounded by mountains of Plugra butter, champagne-colored organic sugar, ScharffenBerger chocolate and local eggs. Listening to Krystian Zimerman play Chopin. Drinking PG Tips tea. And flipping through Maida Heatter’s “Book of Great Cookies.”
It’s a recurring fantasy, seemingly destined to be frustrated forever. Because #1 It’s never cold and rainy in San Diego and #2 It seems there’s always some task that needs to get done before I can indulge my craving for big, fat, homemade Double Chocolate Chunk cookies.
That’s why I was thrilled to make the acquaintance recently of Big Girl Baking Co. Founded in 2004 by three sisters – Jody, Aimee and Regina Milano -- from Yonkers, NY, it’s an intensely personal operation with the focus on fabulous cookies, not flashy packaging or a fancy address. In fact, there is no storefront…cookies are only available on-line and at a few shops and restaurants in Westchester County, outside New York City.
I love the way the sisters play with sweet and savory flavors, adding a pinch of finishing salt to their elegant Sables du Chocolate, and balancing the bite of ginger with a soupcon of sugar in their Very Gingery Snaps.
There’s no sugar overload here. On the contrary, each bite of each cookie reveals layers of flavor, accentuated by sugar but never overwhelmed. There’s dried cherry in the Black Forest Chunks; a whiff of rosemary in the Rosemary Corn Shortbreads; semi-sweet chocolate and espresso in the Mocha Chocolate Chips.
The BG’s Sweet Sesame Polenta Biscuits are sensational (as good with a cup of tea as with a cocktail);
so are the Lilliputian Brown-ettes that are so packed with nuts and chocolate that one little 1x1-inch nugget delivers total satisfaction.
Clearly I couldn't do any better myself...ScharffenBerger or no ScharffenBerger.
The bakery’s biscotti line is no less impressive. More tender than crisp, they feature interesting flavor profiles that make them as at home at the breakfast table as at the bar. Lemon Pine Nut, Black Pepper Fig, Fennel Cornmeal Raisin, Triple Chocolate – these are biscotti to convert all those folks out there who think biscotti are boring and jaw-breaking.
All Big Girl Baking cookies are made from “all natural and/or organic flours and sugars,” with no preservatives or artificial additives. They’re baked and packaged by hand in simple clear bags with a raffia bow. Most varieties cost about $18 a pound; half pounds are available, as are gift assortments. Shop on-line at Big Girl Baking.
what can i do when a cake has not baked all the way through
Posted by: mary | July 03, 2010 at 03:10 PM