I mixed up some zucchini-cookie dough yesterday (delicious recipe posted on my mother's blog) and I discovered just how little I actually know about baking. I thought I was pretty good. I can make chocolate chip cookies in my sleep and have even been daring enough to play with the consistency of the dough. My cookies have always turned out well.
Unfortunately, the zucchini cookie recipe had NO instructions; there was only a list of ingredients and an oven temperature. I asked my mother what to do, and she told me to sift together the dry ingredients. So I added the flour and sugar.... Apparently, sugar isn't dry. Sugar is wet, like butter and eggs (I don't understand it. Who makes up these rules?) My mother caught my mistake, but only after I had mixed 4 cups of sugar and a cup of flour. Upon figuring out that I had just messed up and potentially wasted a ton of sugar, I did the only reasonable thing: I burst into tears.
After bagging the disastrous sugar-flour mixture (apparently there is a use for it) I started again, this time asking my mother and grandmother about each step.
I ran out of time to bake the cookies yesterday, so the dough was set aside in the fridge until this evening. The actual baking part of the process was much more successful. No silly mistakes. No tears. Just dozens and dozens of really really yummy cookies.
1 comment:
When you're up for trying another recipe without instructions, I just know I have some great old ones . . . in fact, I'm anxious to try one that only has ingredients listed . . . no dish name, no directions. I found it written on an envelope with some old papers that belonged to Mother -- I think it just might be for my Aunt Buelah's "pot pie" (wonderful dumplings she cooked in rich broth). And there is no sugar!!!
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