cashew butter balls

The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook Book Tour ended its 2012 run on Monday evening at the New York Public Library in Midtown, as fine of a place to call a finish line as any, and with great company to boot. I know I should say something here that sums up this sprawling, incredible last couple months in one neat paragraph. Theres so much we havent had time to talk about! But, it feels too soon to get my head around all of it and Id rather talk about this here site because as overwhelmingly grand the last few weeks have been, once I got reunited with my kid/husband/bed, its this place Ive missed the most fiddling in the kitchen, sharing things were excited about and chatting in the comments. So thank you for being part of it. I cant wait to catch up.

Id like to tell you that my first foray back into the kitchen was a raging success, alas, this is no time to start teetering on the edge of facts. The second was not much better, and only cemented my hunch that cookbook book tours and cooking are, quite ridiculously, mutually exclusive activities. The third, however, must be shared, despite the fact that the technical errors I encountered were largely avoidable had I, 800-plus site recipes and a cookbook later, yet learned to go with my gut. Why be hasty, right?

You see, a frequently asked question on the tour has been how I go about creating recipes and while the answer is long and boring winding, I can say in the realm of cookies, its a bit more straightforward as most come back to basic formulas that need only a little adjustment for nuance to make them work for a specific flavor profile. Todays case in point is one of my favorite holiday cookies, the Russian Tea Cake/Mexican Wedding Cakes/Nut Crescents/and sometimes Povlorones. 99 percent of the recipes out there follow a formula that works gorgeously each time tender, buttery barely-sweet mounds of cookies hot from the oven roll in the powdery sugared deep before cooling into the only cookie I make consistently from year to year. But when I spied one with slightly more nuts and slightly less flour, I was sent into a neurotic typical tailspin over whether I should a) try something new that might be better or b) not fix what is not broken. In the end, I went for the new and potentially different and while these were probably the most fragile and elegant version of the cookie yet, I am only recommending them below as an alternative recipe, as a cookie that cannot handle tumbling through a freshly-sifted mound of featherlight powdered sugar without breaking in half is probably not a headache anyone needs this weekend.

Really, baking should not cause furrowed brows. It should unwind and make the hallway swoon with the scent of creamed butter, sugar and vanilla toasting against flour. In the background, the Muppets and John Denver should be yukking it up and any adjacent preschoolers should be lightly dusted in powdered sugar as well. Somewhere, someone should be either be mixing you a Perfect Manhattan or plotting your getaway to one.

I typically make this kind of cookie with pecans or walnuts. Ive sometimes used in macadamias or almonds. I even once tweaked them for chestnuts roasted on an open fire in a dinky oven. But Ive never made them or absolutely anything else with cashews because I dont much care for cashews. If you asked me why, Id go on about them tasting rather one-dimensional and flatly sweet, almost buttery but in need of more texture, more salt and maybe a little vanilla. You would probably have the common sense to suggest this means that theyre actually calling out to be included in a cookie (buttery? check. crisp? check. vanilla? check.) I, however, took nearly a decade to come to this conclusion and still another year to finally make them.

You were right, by the way, they make an excellent cookie. Everything I find dull about cashews alone is perfect toasted and embedded in these cookies and although this isnt half as exciting as the other dozen cookies Id dreamed of sharing this month (next December, friends, I may not leave my apartment at all for balance and stuff and you will have all the cookies I owe you) theyre hardly unwelcome an unwelcome addition to any party.

I hope you have a wonderful holiday, friends. I hope somebody bakes you lots of cookies.

For your baking extravaganza: There are 57 cookie recipes in the archives. Where to start? Well, Grasshopper Brownies, of course. Then Spicy Gingerbread Cookies (perfect for houses, squat or tall), Rugelach Pinwheels, Crescent Jam and Cheese Cookies, Seven Layer Cookies, ridiculously decadent Chocolate-Toffee Cookies, Toasted Coconut Shortbread, Austrian Raspberry Shortbread, then how about some Pink Lemonade Bars? From the book, I implore you to not skip the Gooey Cinnamon Squares, a mash-up of Snickerdoodles and St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake I became so obsessed with last year, I begged my editor to let me add them, long past the point I was allowed. Need a great cake to top off your meal? You will never be unwelcome with Gramercy Taverns Gingerbread (I make it every year), a Chocolate Stout Cake or even this flourless Ho-Ho of a Heavenly Chocolate Cake Roll.

One year ago: Nutmeg-Maple Butter Cookies, Caesar-Salad Deviled Eggs and Peppermint Hot Fudge Sauce
Two years ago: Roasted Chestnut Cookies, Garlic Butter Roasted Mushrooms, Iced Oatmeal Cookies, Broiled Mussels and Spicy Gingerbread Cookies
Three years ago: Creamed Spinach, Gingerbread Apple Upside-Down Cake, Cappuccino Fudge Cheesecake, Balsamic-Braised Brussels Sprouts with Pancetta, Cream Biscuits, Coffee Toffee, Vanilla Roasted Pears and a little guide to Building Your Own Smitten Kitchen
Four years ago: Cauliflower Salad with Green Olives and Capers, Onion Tart with Mustard and Fennel, Apple Pancakes, Fennel, Proscuitto and Pomegranate Salad, Meyer Lemon and Fresh Cranberry Scones and Winter Fruit Salad
Five years ago: Pumpkin Waffles, Creamy White Polenta With Mushrooms, Oatmeal, Chocolate Chip and Pecan Cookies, Nutmeg-Maple Cream Pie, Tiramisu Cake, Fennel Ice Cream and Chicken and Dumplings
Six years ago: Sundried Tomato Stuffed Mushrooms, Orangettes, Honey-Hoisin Pork Riblets and Chocolate Chip Sour Cream Coffee Cake

Cashew Butter Balls
Inspired by the Tasting Table Test Kitchens

It was one of my favorite food newsletters that put the idea of a cashew spin on one of my favorite cookies into my head last winter, however, in the end, I preferred my go-to formula (with slightly less nuts and slightly more flour) to theirs as mine crumbles less. I also nixed the nutmeg, added some vanilla and replaced the granulated sugar with powdered sugar, but kept the name because I love it too much to part with it. I also give a flaky salt option, because I think a faint crunch of salt contrasts wonderfully with sweet cashews.

Oh, and (big and!), I adapted the recipe for a one-bowl assembly in a food processor, yay. If you dont have one, grind your nuts in whatever you have around (mini-grinder, coffee grinder, etc.) to a powder (I find grinding them with a bit of the flour makes them less prone to turn to a nut butter), then whip the butter and 1/2 cup powdered sugar with an electric mixer until fluffy. Add the vanilla. Whisk together the ground nuts, flour and salt separately and mix them into the butter mixture until just combined. Chill and scoop as directed below.

If youd like to make the recipe as TT suggests, use 1/4 cup more cashews and 1/4 cup less flour and only move them from tray to sugar to cooling rack with the gentleness of feathers. Once they cool, theyll firm up enough that theyre less fragile, although I still wouldnt recommend them for shipping. Nope, youll have to keep them for yourself.

1 cup (145 grams) raw cashews
2 cups (250 grams) all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon table salt, or a heaped 1/4 teaspoon sea salt flakes
1 cup (2 sticks or 230 grams) unsalted butter, softened slightly, cut into chunks
2 cups (240 grams) powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Heat oven to 350F and toast cashews in a single layer until a shade darker, about 10 to 12 minutes. About halfway through the toasting time, toss the nuts around to redistribute them for even coloring. Let cool completely. You can hasten this along by transferring them to the freezer for a few minutes.

Place cooled cashews, flour and salt in the workbowl of a food processor. Clear the kitchen of toddlers and others sensitive to loud noises, then grind the mixture to a fine powder. Pour mixture into a bowl and set aside briefly.

Add butter and *only* 1/2 cup of the powdered sugar to the empty food processor and run the machine until the mixture is creamy and combined. Add the vanilla and mix. Add the nut-flour mixture and pulse the machine until it is just combined. Scrape the soft cookie dough back into the bowl that held the nut-flour mixture, cover it with plastic wrap, and refrigerate it until firm, about an hour.

[Do ahead: You can chill it in the fridge for up to 2 days, or in the freezer for longer.]

Heat your oven back to 300&176F. Place remaining 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar in a wide bowl. Using your hands, scoop tablespoon-sized (about 1-inch round) balls of the chilled cookie dough into your palms and quickly roll them into little balls. Place them evenly on a parchment-lined baking sheet an inch apart. Bake 20 to 25 minutes, until they feel dry on the outside, but still quite soft. (Dont fret!)

Let cool on sheets for a few minutes, then gently roll the hot cookies in the powdered sugar before transferring them to racks to cool completely.

Cookies keep in an airtight container for at least a week, probably two, though never at my place. They can be frozen for as long as you trust your freezer. They occasionally benefit from a fresh coating of powdered sugar before serving.

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flag cake

Last year, I brought a flag cake to a 4th of July rooftop barbecue. Earlier in the week, Id harbored fantasies about making an elaborate ice cream cake or layered berry yogurt popsicles or salads teetering on the edge of food safety standards but New York City, as it always seems to be in the first week of July, was at the crest of a week-plus of ever-increasing temperatures and stickiness, a summit where it tends to linger for a few even more airless days before finally releasing the thunder and lightening, sinking the mercury back to a brief day or two of something resembling temperate before it starts the climb again. What, me? No fan of NYC summers? Where would you get such an idea?

(This is also the time of year, every year, where I break my please-dont-be-so-dull-as-to-complain-about-the-weather-Deb rule. Forgive me) Anyway, the heat got the better of my ambitions and I decided to make a simple yellow sheet cake with cream cheese frosting and an arrangement of patriotic berries that had, in fact, been imported from Baja. To me, it was good, cute even, but nothing crazy, just something Id seen kicked around magazines and TV shows for two decades, hardly a revolutionary idea. My friends, however many of whom use their ovens for sweater storage and gasp! do not spend their days ingesting various formats of food media went absolutely ballistic over it. When strangers from other parties on the roof started taking some, they became possessive of their cake and shooed them away. The told me in no uncertain terms would I ever be welcome at a July 4th party again without it.

Of course, I didnt listen. Yesterday, ignoring this, I decided that I must be the type of person who likes to make insane cakes I saw on Pinterest. I am, in fact, not, but by the time I remembered this my kitchen, arms, all of my towels, and my toddler were covered with food dye and the sticky residue of a red-white-and-lets-never-talk-about-this-again disaster. Then I remembered this lovely, dead-simple cake that I should have been making instead. Did I mention its a quickie? That it involves no piping bags, no strained warmed jam glazes, no pastry crusts and, most importantly, food dye? That I had streamlined my standard yellow birthday cake into a virtually one-bowl, single layer recipe, presuming we all have better things to do this evening than scrub out a sink full of dishes? That the frosting is a dump-and-whip kind of thing? And the berries just need to be rinsed and patted dry? Next year, and all the years after that until the end of the time, Im going to listen to my friends and make this flag cake. I think you should too.

One year ago: Flatbreads with Honey, Thyme and Sea Salt
Two years ago: Sour Cherry Pie with Almond Crumble and Porch Swing
Three years ago: Cherry Brown Butter Bars and Watermelon Lemonade
Four years ago: Project Wedding Cake
Five years ago: Classic Madeleines

Flag Cake

If you have access to white raspberries, you can use them for the white stripes instead of powdering the raspberries. You could also use them to make stars in the blueberry portion.

If you wash your berries I tend to just look them over for dirt, and then decide if they need an extra rinse make sure to get them very dry. Youll want them to be fully dry on the outside or the powdered sugar wont stay on top. (That said, even the ones I had that were slightly more damp, still kept their white appearance, even with more pink popping through, so dont drive yourself bonkers trying to keep berries dry.)

I like to serve (and carry) this cake in the pan, rustic style, so I let it cool completely in there. If youd like to unmold it to serve on a different platter, let it cool on the rack for 15 minutes, before flipping it over onto another rack, removing the parchment paper, and flipping it back onto a serving platter. The frosting amount suggested is just for the top of the cake, but its a generous layer, so if youd like to frost the sides, you can use the same amount and it will be thinner all around, or you can increase the frosting volume by half and cover the sides evenly. You may also unmold the cake and still only frost the top, leaving the sides bare.

Cake
2 sticks (1 cup, 1/2 pound or 225 grams) unsalted butter, softened
2 cups (400 grams) sugar
4 large eggs, at room temperature
2 teaspoons (10 ml) pure vanilla extract
4 cups (465 grams) cake flour or 3 2/3 cups (460 grams) all-purpose flour plus 1/3 cup (45 grams) cornstarch
2 teaspoons (10 grams) baking powder
1 teaspoon (5 grams) baking soda
1 teaspoon (6 grams) table salt
2 cups buttermilk (475 ml), well-shaken

Frosting
8-ounce (225 gram) block cream cheese, at room temperature
1/2 cup (1 stick or 1/4 pound) butter, at room temperature
1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract
2 to 3 cups (240 to 360 grams) powdered sugar

Decoration
Powdered sugar
1 cup blueberries (1/2 pint, about 170 grams), very dry
3 cups raspberries (1 1/2 pints, about 360 grams), very dry

Make cake: Preheat oven to 350F. Butter a 913-inch baking pan and line the bottom with a rectangle of parchment paper, then butter parchment. (Or, you can use a nonstick cooking spray instead of butter for speed and ease.)

Beat butter and sugar together in the bottom of a large bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy, at least 3 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, scraping down the bowl between each addition. Add vanilla extract. Place flour, cornstarch (if using), baking powder, baking soda and table salt in a sifter or fine-mesh strainer and shake half of mixture into mixing bowl. (If this makes a huge mess, you can also do so onto a piece of waxed paper and use that to dump it into the mixing bowl.) Mix until just combined. Add buttermilk and stir it in slowly, because it will splash easily. The mixture might look curdled, but it will come together just fine in a moment. Add remaining dry ingredients and mix until combined.

Pour batter in prepared pan and smooth top. Bake until golden and a wooden pick inserted in center of cake comes out clean, [updated!] 30 to 35 minutes my initial notes said 35 minutes baking time, but early testers report it took 45 to 50, which, frankly, sounds a little closer to what Id expect. Please, check at 35 and if the cake is quite battery still, come back in 10 minutes to check again. Dont remove the cake until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean. Once it does, transfer the cake to a rack to cool completely.

Make frosting Beat cream cheese and butter together until light and very fluffy, scraping down the sides to make sure no pesky cream cheese is left unmixed. Add the vanilla. Add the first cup of powdered sugar, and beat it until combined. Add the second. I prefer my cream cheese frostings less sweet, so I stopped there. Because the frosting is just going to be a layer between the berries and cake, it doesnt need to be terribly stiff, so you can get away with skipping the additional cup of sugar. However, if yours still seems way too soft to use as frosting or not sweet enough, add the third cup of powdered sugar.

If your cake is very domed on top and youd rather it be flat, you can level it a bit with a small serrated knife. Spread frosting evenly over top of cake. Or not evenly. Nobody will know, which is another reason why this cake is the greatest.

Decorate away Place your powdered sugar in a sifter or fine-mesh strainer. If youve got an open tea strainer, this is a great time to use it, although it will only hold a spoonful at a time. The short side of the blue rectangle of an American flag yes, I looked this up, and yes, I need a hobby will fall at roughly half the height of the short side of your cake. The long side will fall at a little more than one-third the width of your cake. You can outline this shape with blueberries. Then, dot a few blueberries inside, spaced apart. Coat the inside berries with a dusting of powdered sugar. Then, fill the rest of the space with uncoated blueberries.

An American flag has 13 stripes total, beginning and ending with a red stripe. Unless you have really tiny berries, youre not going to fit all of them and nobody, least of you, should care. Eyeball the width your first row of raspberries will take up, and start your second row after that (approximately 1/2 to 2/3-inch down). Continue this pattern of an empty row followed by a row of raspberries the rest of the way down your cake. Coat these rows with a dusting of powdered sugar. Fill the empty rows with uncoated raspberries. Admire your pretty work. Cover pan with lid or foil and refrigerate until needed for your party/picnic/barbecue.

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Flag Sheet Cake - Martha Stewart Recipes - Delicious Food Recipes ... Get Martha Stewart's Flag Sheet Cake recipe. Also browse hundreds more test kitchen-approved food recipes and cooking tips from Martha Stewart. Flag Cake Recipe Taste of Home Recipes - Find Recipes ... Find recipes for Flag Cake and other Baby Shower Recipe recipes. Get all the best recipes at Taste of Home. Recipe directions: Line a 13-in. x 9-in. baking pan with ... Flag Cake recipe Very easy to make and tastes great! Very light and perfect for a summer barbeque. Used angel food cake, and 2 tubs of the small whipped topping. Easy American flag cake Recipe - Recipes Recipe for Easy American Flag Cake. This 4th of July cake is so easy that you could make it with your eyes closed. Let the kids in on the fun, they may surprise you ... The Coolest Fourth of July Cake I've Ever Seen - The Secret Life ... Fourth of July Layered Red, White and Blue Flag Cake with cream cheese frosting, The Secret Life of a Chef's Wife Flag Cake Duncan Hines Duncan Hines Classic White Cake smothered in juicy strawberries, fresh blueberries and sweet marshmallows. Decorate your Flag Cake for the most patriotic dessert ever. Flag Cake - American Flag Cake - Patriotic Cake Recipe This flag cake makes a great patriotic cake recipe for Memorial Day or 4th of July. This American flag cake starts with a cake mix and is decorated with blueberries ... Flag Cake Recipe : Ina Garten : Recipes : Food Network 1 hr 15 min; 18 tablespoons (2 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter at room temperature; 3 cups sugar; 6 extra-large eggs at room temperature; 1 cup sour cream at room ... Cooks.com - Recipes - Flag Cake FOURTH OF JULY FLAG CAKE: Ingredients: 5 (blueberries .. strawberries .. sugar ... FLAG POKE CAKE: This cake is wonderful for a ... left corner where you will place ... Decorating a Flag Cake Article - Allrecipes.com A step-by-step tutorial for decorating a flag cake. ... Do More FREE! SAVE favorites in your Recipe Box; CREATE and save shopping lists