When you’re ready to bake, preheat the oven to 375°. With a sharp knife, slice the logs into rounds about ¼ inch thick. Place 1 inch apart on an unoiled baking sheet. Bake for 8 to 12 minutes, until the cookies retain a slight indentation when lightly touched in the center and are golden brown on the bottom. Remove the cookies from the baking sheet while they’re still warm.
INGREDIENT NOTES For crisper cookies, add ¾ teaspoon of baking soda with the flour.
For puffier cookies, add 1 tablespoon of baking powder with the flour.
serving & menu ideas
For delicious sandwich cookies, spread peanut butter or Nutella between the bottoms of two cooled cookies.
two sweet sauces
These two sauces are useful whenever you need to make a dessert in a hurry. Made in minutes, they can turn plain ice cream or store-bought poundcake into something special.
peanut butter chocolate sauce
You can make this sauce ahead of time and store it in the refrigerator. When ready to serve, reheat, stirring frequently, until melted.
YIELDS 1½ CUPS
TIME: 10 MINUTES
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
2 tablespoons sugar
½ cup water or milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
¼ cup creamy or crunchy peanut butter
In a double boiler or a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, melt the chocolate chips and sugar in the water or milk, stirring with a whisk until smooth and shiny. Whisk in the vanilla and peanut butter.
blueberry lemon sauce
This twilight-blue sweet-tart sauce will keep in the refrigerator for up to a week. Made in a food processor, it’s thicker than when made in the blender.
YIELDS 2 CUPS
TIME: 10 MINUTES
1 pound frozen or fresh blueberries (about 3 cups)
⅓ cup sugar
pinch of salt
2 teaspoons lemon juice
In a saucepan on medium heat, bring the blueberries, sugar, salt, and a tablespoon of water to a simmer, stirring often, until the mixture is juicy. Cook for a few minutes, until the blueberries are soft.
In a blender or food processor, whirl the blueberries with the lemon juice until smooth. Add additional sugar to taste. Add more water if you want a thinner sauce.
5-minute milkshakes
Whip up one of these pretty pastel shakes for a casual dessert or any time you finish supper wishing you had made dessert. We suggest Chai Shake after a curry, Vanilla Rum Milkshake after West Indian Red Beans & Coconut Rice, Pineapple Ginger Shake after Asian Braised Fish with Greens—you get the picture.
SERVES 2
TIME: 5 MINUTES
In a blender, purée the ingredients until smooth, about 30 seconds. Pour into small glasses and serve immediately.
orange vanilla shake
1 cup orange juice
1 cup vanilla ice cream
1 teaspoon grated orange peel (optional)
chocolate malt
1 cup vanilla ice cream
2 tablespoons chocolate syrup
¼ cup Ovaltine or other malt powder
¾ cup milk
vanilla rum milkshake
1 cup vanilla ice cream
2 tablespoons rum
1 cup milk
2 tablespoons brown sugar
grated nutmeg for sprinkling on top
banana milkshake
1 cup vanilla ice cream
1 cup milk
1 ripe banana
ground cinnamon or grated nutmeg for sprinkling on top
chai shake
1 cup vanilla ice cream
1 cup chilled chai (look for aseptic boxes on supermarket shelves near the soy milk)
pineapple ginger shake
½ cup pineapple juice
1 cup vanilla ice cream
½ teaspoon peeled and grated ginger root
1 tablespoon lime juice
When your pantry is stocked with interesting foods and your freezer is full, you can eat well without a trip to the market. The authors of Simple Suppers are all Moosewood cooks, and there are plenty of days when we don’t want supper at home to be a major culinary production. A little time in the kitchen, yes. Creative? Maybe. Masterful? We hope. Time-consuming? No. Some days we have a hankering for something in particular and so we stop at the store, but most days when it’s time for dinner we check what’s in the cupboard and refrigerator and pull out our favorite simple supper ingredients.
Each of us has different favorite staples, items that may not have been in our pantries a few years ago but that we regularly use for convenience and good taste today. Our current collective top-ten list of favorites for convenience in our home kitchens includes little cans of smoky-hot chipotle peppers packed in flavorful adobo sauce, frozen edamame, bags of refrigerated slaw mix, quart boxes of organic vegetable broth, Chinese chili paste, Thai curry paste, frozen collards, cans of diced tomatoes, Keiffer lime leaves in freezer bags, and seasoned tofu.
Here is a more extensive, but not exhaustive, list of things you might find in the home kitchen of a Moosewood cook for the recipes in this book and beyond.In the Cupboard
Quart boxes of organic vegetable, mushroom, and mock chicken broth; canned whole and diced tomatoes; salsa (we recommend Herdez and Pace brands); chipotles in adobo sauce; peanut butter; artichoke hearts; coconut milk; roasted red peppers; jams or fruit spreads; oils (olive oil, extra-virgin olive oil, vegetable or canola oil, dark sesame oil); vinegars (cider, wine, white, balsamic, rice); beans and peas (black beans, black-eyed peas, butter beans, cannellini, chickpeas, small red beans, field peas—we recommend Goya, Cora Natural, The Allens, Westbrae, and Eden brands of canned beans); dry lentils (red, green, French); dry split peas (yellow, green); raisins and currants; hijiki seaweed, sun-dried tomatoes; dried mushrooms (porcini, shiitake, cremini).
Spices and Dried Herbs Red pepper flakes, cayenne, allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, ginger, curry powder, garam masala, turmeric, saffron, paprika, Old Bay seasoning, bay leaves, sage, rosemary, thyme, tarragon, oregano, basil, dill, mint (we use spearmint and peppermint herbal teas), cumin, coriander, fennel, and black mustard seeds.
Grains Rice (brown, jasmine, basmati, arborio, white), polenta cornmeal, grits, couscous, kasha, bulghur, quinoa.
Pasta Italian pasta (fettuccine, spaghetti, linguine, orzo, farfalle, penne, etc. rice noodles, soba noodles, udon noodles.In the Refrigerator
Mayonnaise, mustard, horseradish, barbecue sauce, hoisin sauce, Tabasco or other hot sauce, soy sauce, Chinese chili paste, Thai curry paste, olives, pickles and/or relish, capers, tofu, seitan, miso, fresh ginger
