“I love this. It’s like, how often do you
get to hit something really Hard and it to just
be O.K., good even?” [MUSIC PLAYING] “Hi. I’m Melissa Clark. I’m a food reporter for ‘The
New York Times.’ And we’re Here in the NYT Cooking
kitchen studio to bring you Cookie Week, the best week
of the year because it’s The holidays, and it means
sweet, delicious things. And I can’t wait to bake my
new peppermint shortbread Cookies for you. I love shortbread. They’re my favorite
kind of cookies. They’re crunchy. They’re buttery. These shortbread have
a peppermint flavor And a peppermint icing. So they are double peppermint
shortbread cookies. What’s great about shortbread
is they’re also really easy To make, and they keep
for such a long time. You can make shortbreads
a couple of weeks ahead. They are the most
adaptable cookie, And they’re the easiest for
a home cook to put their own Stamp on. The most basic
shortbread recipe, It’s just three ingredients,
flour, butter, and sugar. If you can get really,
really good, high fat butter, It’s just going to make
your cookies better. But any kind of butter is
still going to be delicious. Always save your
butter wrappers. Just fold them in
half like that. Stick them in your freezer,
and next time you have To butter a cake pan,
voila, you’ve got them.
We’re very thrifty in this
kitchen here at NYT Cooking. A note about salted butter — I’m using unsalted butter. You can use salted
butter, like maybe some Of that imported really
amazing salted butter Or salted cultured butter,
so good in shortbread, But just cut down on the
salt by like a quarter Teaspoon if you end up
using salted butter, Just to balance it out. I’m going to whip the sugar
and the butter until it’s Light and fluffy. This is going to take a while. It’s going to take
like two minutes. So we’re just going
to let the mixer go. So start out slow. Wait till the sugar begins to
be absorbed into the butter, And then you can
raise the mixer speed. Scrape down the sides, just
to make sure you’re getting Everything evenly mixed. I’m just going to
give it a little more. You really want
it to be fluffy. So I’m going to
add the egg yolk, And we’re going to save the
white because we need it For the icing. And egg yolk gives a
little more richness And a little more color. Now, the thing about
the peppermint extract Is the flavor gets milder. It dissipates when the
cookies sit for a few days. So if you’re going to eat
these on the same day that You’re baking them, only add
about an 1/8 of a teaspoon. But if you’re going to let
them sit for a couple of days, Use a quarter of a teaspoon. And then in 24
hours, 48 hours,
It’s going to mellow
out and be perfect. So for the dry ingredients,
I have my flour here. Salt, really, it does more
than just season the cookies. It brings out all the
other flavors, and then The baking powder. And that just opens up
the crumb structure, And it makes it
slightly less crisp. Because you’re going to have
icing on them and the icing Has a little snap to it,
I want the cookie to be Especially tender and
melt in the mouth. I am just going to
give this a stir, And then I’m going to sift
it directly into the butter Mixture. Sifting aerates the
flour a little bit, Makes it easier to mix in. It is not strictly necessary,
but it’s a nice little touch. And then you just
want to mix it Until the flour is
absorbed into the dough. So don’t overmix it. We’re going to wrap it
all up and let it chill In the fridge. And then you can just use
your plastic wrap to squish it Together into a ball and then
we’ll flatten it into a disk. And that is it. So put it in the fridge
at least an hour, And you can leave it
in there for five days. You can also freeze it
for up to six months. I’m going to roll the cookie
dough out between two sheets Of parchment paper. It’s so much easier than
flouring everything. And it’s better for the
cookies because the cookies Don’t absorb extra flour. So hitting it is
not necessary. You can just really
lean into it.
But I find it easier than
using my body weight to lean Into it at the beginning. So there is a reason that
I am beating this dough up With a rolling pin. And you’re going to start to
feel it soften as you do it. And you see, I keep
moving the paper around. That’s just to help me
find the thick parts. And so what I’m looking for
is I want this dough to be Evenly, a quarter inch thick. This is just a little
extra insurance. I’m going to dip the
cookie cutter in flour. These cookies are not very wet
or sticky, but just in case, You know it’ll come
out with a clean cut.” “Do you have a whole box
full of cookie cutters?” “I have three giant boxes
full of cookie cutters. After the cookie
decorating party, There is glitter
in our rug for — No matter how much I vacuum,
like, still sprinkles. So enough with the plain one. Let’s have fun. Let’s do some shapes. Great. Just as an insurance policy,
I’m going to put this In the fridge for
a few minutes. So the dough is
firmed up nicely. And we can just transfer
it to this baking sheet. And then you can save the
scraps and reroll them. Just chill them before
you reroll them. Sometimes I do this. This is one of my cheats. When I have a big thing
of dough like that, I will just squish
it together. Then we can get
another cookie. Ha ha.
These cookies don’t
expand very much, So you can place them
pretty close together. And I’m going to bake
these at 350 for, I say, 13 to 17 minutes. But just keep an eye on them. You want them to look
golden around the edges. And then they should
feel nice and firm.” [MUSIC PLAYING] “I like a really simple
royal icing for these kinds Of cookies, because
first of all, It hardens well so that you
can pack it into a cookie box Really easily. Royal icing is just
powdered sugar, egg whites, A little bit of salt,
and cream of tartar. So cream of tartar is
your best friend here. It’s like an insurance
policy that you’re not going To overbeat the eggs. Again, start your
mixer on low. And that was our
egg white that we Had saved, along with two
more egg whites, so three egg Whites all together. I’m also I’m going to add just
a little bit of peppermint Extract into the royal
icing just to bring out The peppermint
flavor of the cookie. So you can see it’s
like marshmallowy. And I am going to add a little
bit of water because I want A thinner consistency because
I’m going to pour it onto The cookies to decorate it. My goal is I want the icing to
be able to run off the spoon. See how that’s pouring nicely. And I’m going to keep
half of it white, And I’m going to transfer
half of it into another bowl, And I’m going to add
my food coloring. Here’s the thing
about royal icing.
It will start to thicken up
and actually dry out on top, If you let it
sit for too long. So if you’re not going
to use it immediately, Make sure to cover the
top with plastic wrap. And if it does start to get
a little crusty looking, Just take a whisk and a little
bit of water and just whisk it Up again and it’ll be O.K. So red is one of
those really hard Colors to get with just
regular supermarket Food coloring. You keep adding it,
and you keep adding it, And you’re like,
it’s still pink. It’s still pink. Why is it pink? When you’re doing that, you’re
going to thin out the icing Even more. So if you’re using just
regular supermarket food Coloring, which is fine, just
know you’re going to have To add a lot of it, and you
should make the icing slightly Thicker than what we just did. Better if you can find
gel food coloring. So this is a more
intense color. It will give you
a brighter color Without adding much liquid. See how it’s marbly right now? Know what you could do? Can I do it? Can I do it? Take a cookie and
just go, boop? I’m going off script here. This is just so pretty. Look at that. Just take a cookie and just — Look how pretty that is.
It’s like a little
candy cane kiss. So that’s an option for you. You can really
have fun with this. So what we did this year for
the holiday box is we made Them almost like black
and white cookies, Except they’re red
and white cookies. Take your cookie. You just draw a line
with your spoon. And as your icing sits, it’s
going to get a little thicker And a little bit darker. If you want to thin
it out at any point, Just add a few drops of water. And we’re going to do all of
the red and then let it dry. And then we’re going to
come back and do the white.” [MUSIC PLAYING] “Make sure that
these dry completely. If you can, just let
them dry overnight, And that is the best. So this is perfectly dry. And you see how the icing got
a little bit darker as it sat. And now, we will do the
white, so same thing On the other side. Draw your little line. This did get a bit
thicker as it sat. I might water it down
just a little bit. Also, if I did add too much
water and it got too thin, You can always fix it with a
little more powdered sugar. It’s very forgiving. Yeah, that’s good. When I was developing
these recipes, I was developing, really,
the look of the icing. I tried many different ways. At one point, I put
crushed candy cane On the white part, which
looked really pretty.
Another look that
we tried out was Once we had the
darker color, just Dunk in the lighter color. And these look
pretty cool, too. We’re going to let them dry. And they are ready. And they are so cute. I love them. I think they’re really sweet. Do I get to eat them now? They’re so good. Peppermint is there. But it is not in-your-face. And the best part is
a textural contrast. You’ve got the cookie, which
is crumbly and buttery, And then the snap
of the royal icing. I just love it. If you are thinking about
making a cookie box, I would say leave
yourself more time Than you think you need. Don’t try to do it all in
the couple of days leading up To when you want to
give out the boxes. You can probably
make the dough ahead. Put it in your fridge
or your freezer. Most cookies will last
for a couple of weeks If you store them airtight,
and then added bonus, You will have them in
your house for a few weeks Before you have
to give them away, Which means you can
exercise quality Control on a daily basis. This is a good thing. This is the best
part of Cookie Week, When I get my box. Thank you, Phoebe.
First of all, can we just
admire how beautiful this is? So when you’re doing
your own cookie box, Try to make it as
beautiful as this one. This is gorgeous. You can find all of these
cookie recipes and cookie Recipes from years back. You can go so deep into
our cookie archives Nytcooking.com. It should be nytcookie.com. Why don’t we do that
for Cookie Week? Woo. This is a party in a box.” [MUSIC PLAYING]
Have you ever wondered why most of the Vinaigrettes in the grocery store are made with 10, 20, sometimes even almost 30 ingredients? I remember growing up in Provence watching my mother whipping vinaigrettes before every single dinner. She would mix in a giant bowl, delicious extra virgin olive oil, a robust aged vinegar (the flavor would depend on the main dish), sea salt and pepper and voila! I decided to do the same thing for my family and friends more than 20 years ago here in this beautiful country. And Provence Kitchen® was born. Stay tune for more articles and wonderful family recipes..
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