sarah kiefer Archives

The Trifecta Cookie-Neopolitan Cookie

By threejamigos | December 16, 2020 | Comments 2 comments

As a kid, I loved Neopolitan Ice Cream Sandwiches. I mean who didn’t? It was like getting three different flavors of ice cream all at once AND a chocolate cookie. Dessert Jackpot. I would eat my ice cream sandwich slowly, savoring every bite. By the last bite, rivulets of ice cream would be running down my hand and arm. A favorite childhood treat…

…that went long forgotten until I came across the Neopolitan Cookie in Sarah Kiefer’s 100 Cookies book. Her Neopolitan Cookies shot to the top of the Gotta Make It Bucket List as soon as I saw them.

A while back we made Irvin Lin’s Strawberry and Cream Cookies, from Marbled, Swirled, and Layered. They were delicious, but a lot of work including melting chocolate and making two different doughs, hai-yah. The beauty of Sarah Kiefer’s Neopolitan Cookies is it’s not that much more effort for a showstopper cookie. These cookies start with just one dough, a sugar cookie dough. It is then divided into thirds, freeze-dried strawberry powder is added to one portion and cocoa powder to another. Boom, done. It is helpful to have a scale to divide the dough into thirds. I love my scale.

You can find freeze-dried berries at Trader Joe’s, feel free to use raspberry instead of strawberry. Dutch-process cocoa created a rich chocolate color that looked just like the Neopolitan chocolate. The cocoa powder did make the chocolate dough a bit crumbly, which we fixed by adding a touch of water (up to a tablespoon max, add a teaspoon at a time), use just enough to bring the dough together. Try not to overwork your dough.

To shape the cookies, portion out each dough with an ice cream scoop (we used a #70 which is 2.75 teaspoons), then gently smoosh the three balls of dough together and roll into one round ball keeping the colors separate.

If you are a Star Trek fan, don’t these remind you of Tribbles?

Roll the balls in sanding sugar to give it a nice festive look. Sarah suggests sprinkles that match each color of dough. It’s your choice. These cookies spread quite a bit so don’t crowd them on the baking sheet. Don’t overbake, you want a cookie with crispy edges but a chewy center. These are smashing to look at, delicious, and worth the extra step.

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Neopolitan Cookies

Remember Neopolitan Ice Cream Sandwiches? Here it is in a delicious cookie.

Course cookies

Cuisine American

Keyword cookies, Neopolitan Cookies, Sarah Kiefer

Prep Time 30

Cook Time 11

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups plus 1 tablespoon [364 g] all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup [8 g] freeze-dried strawberries substitute raspberries
1 cup [2 sticks | 227 g] unsalted butter room temperature
1 3/4 cup [350 g] granulated sugar
1 large egg plus 1 large yolk
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
2 or 3 drops red food coloring optional
2 tablespoons Dutch-process cocoa powder or Cocoa Noir (black cocoa)
Sprinkles, sanding sugar or granulated sugar for rolling

Instructions

Adjust an oven rack to the middle of the oven. Preheat the oven to 350F [180C]. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
In a bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
Pulverize the berries into a powder with a rolling pin or in a food processor
Using a stand mixer, beat butter on medium speed until creamy, about 1 minute. Add sugar and beat on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 2 to 3 minutes. Add egg, egg yolk, and vanilla, and beat on medium speed until combined. Add the flour mixture and beat on low speed until just combined.
Take the dough out and divide into three equal portions, I use a scale. Put one-third of the dough back into the mixer and add the powdered strawberries/raspberries and food coloring, if using. Mix on low speed until totally combined, then remove the dough and wipe out the bowl.
Add another third of dough to the mixer. Add the cocoa powder and mix on low speed until totally combined. If it is too crumbly add a teaspoon of water to bring it together. Try taking it out of the mixer and kneading it a little.
Use a #70 ice cream scoop to form balls of each of the three doughs or pinch a small portion (about 1/2 oz [15 g]) of each, and press them gently together, so they adhere to each other, but colors remain distinct. Shape each into a ball, then roll the ball into sprinkles or granulated sugar. Place 6 or 7 cookies on each sheet pan.
Bake the cookies one pan at a time, rotating halfway through baking. Bake until the sides are set and the cookies are puffed, 10 to 11 minutes. Rap the cookies on the rack as you pull them out so they deflate. This will improve the crackle appearance. If the cookies are baked too long they will have fewer cracks.
Transfer the sheet pan to a wire rack and let the cookies cool for 5 to 10 minutes on the pan, then remove them and let them cool completely on the wire rack.
Cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 2 days.

Thin, Crispy, Gooey, Chocolate Chip Cookies-Get It On, Bang a Pan

By threejamigos | December 11, 2020 | Comments 0 Comment

I have been a slouch when it comes to holiday cookies this year. LUCKY FOR ME, Jamie is home and baking up a storm…I get the difficult task of eating and posting about whatever deliciousness she has baked up.

I had all this planned of course. My copy of Sarah Kiefer’s 100 Cookies finally arrived which I then strategically left on the kitchen island in full view. Heh, heh, heh. The book is a beauty both in content and style.

She took the bait. Flipping through the book, Jamie landed on the Neopolitan Cookies exclaimed “so making these”. I kept nodding enthusiastically with every cookie she mentioned. We loved the Neapolitans, buttery, chewy, flavored with vanilla, strawberry, and cocoa. These are definitely going in the rotation. The Smores Bars were labor-intensive but worth the effort. Imagine a blondie base, coated with chocolate and topped with a layer of toasty homemade marshmallow fluff.

Despite the many CCC recipes we have, her Chocolate Chip Cookies and the pan banging technique proved irresistible. All we can say is make room for this bad boy in your chocolate chip cookie file, it’s that good. The cookies are thin, crisp-edged yet soft in the center. They’re dotted with chopped dark chocolate bits and finished with a sprinkle of Fleur de Sel. The dough is sweet so don’t skip the Fleur de sel and definitely use dark chocolate for balance.

You should be running to your kitchen now to make these.

Pan-banging

No, not headbanging which is what I have been doing all year, it’s been that kinda year. I first came across pan-banging in Sarabeth’s Bakery cookbook (a beautiful cookbook) Sarabeth’s Kitchen is a New York institution known for their breakfasts, jams, and baked goods. Her version of Chocolate Chip Cookies, Chocolate Clouds, calls for rapping the pan on the oven rack with a couple of minutes left in baking. This causes the cookies to deflate and develop their signature cracks. I adopted this rapping the pan for several of my drop cookie recipes including the Oatmeal Apricot Cookies from Dahlia Bakery. Love the way cracks and crevices look in drop cookies.

Sarah takes it to a whole new level, by repeatedly banging the pan in 2-minute intervals, you get these super cool circular ridges that look like a tree’s age rings. The cookies bake thin and flat, they spread quite a bit, so plan on about 5 cookies per baking sheet.

So take your 2020 aggressions out by making these pan banging chocolate chip cookies and end up with beastly cookies. Win-win.

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Chocolate Chip Cookies (100 Cookies)

From 100 Cookies Thin and Crispy, Ridged Chocolate Chip Cookies

Course cookies

Cuisine American

Keyword chocolate chip cookies

Prep Time 20

Cook Time 10 14

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour (284 grams) Gold Medal AP Flour will give you better ridges
½ teaspoon baking soda
¾ teaspoon salt
½ pound unsalted butter (227 grams) 2 sticks, room temperature
1 ½ cups granulated sugar (300 grams)
¼ cup brown sugar (55 grams) dark brown preferred
1 large egg
2 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
6 ounces bittersweet chocolate (170 grams) about 60 percent cacao solids, chopped into coarse pieces, bits and shards. We used TJ's Pound Plus Dark Chocolate
Fleur de sel or Maldon Salt, for sprinkling

Instructions

Adjust an oven rack to the middle position. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper
In a small bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda and salt.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle, beat the butter on medium until creamy about 1 minute. Add the granulated and brown sugars and beat on medium until light and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the egg, vanilla and 2 tablespoons water, and mix on low to combine. Add the flour mixture, and mix on low until combined. Add the chocolate and mix on low into the batter. (At this point, the dough can be refrigerated for several hours or overnight.)
Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Form the dough into 2.5 ounce (~70 gram) balls (#24 ice cream scoop 1/3 cup each). Place 4-5 balls an equal distance apart on pan.
Place the baking sheet in the oven and bake 7 minutes, until the cookies are puffed slightly in the center. Lift the baking sheet and let it drop down against the oven rack, so the edges of the cookies set and the inside falls back down. (This will feel wrong, but trust me.) Bang it down, if necessary, to make the center fall.
After the cookies puff up again, 2 minutes later, repeat lifting and dropping the pan. Repeat a few more times, every 2 minutes, to create ridges around the edge of the cookie. Bake 13 to 14 minutes total, until the cookies have spread out, and the edges are golden brown, but the centers are much lighter and not fully cooked.
Transfer the baking sheet to a wire rack and sprinkle with Fleur de sel or Maldon salt. Let cool10-15 minutes before removing the cookies from the pan.
Repeat with remaining cookies. Store in an airtight container.

Notes

We used a #24 ice cream scoop, ~2.5 ounces and baked for 14 minutes. The original recipe calls for 3 ounces of dough and bake for 15-16 minutes.

You can use King Arthur Flour (higher protein) but it may not develop as many ridges.

I would recommend weighing ingredients, esp flour, for accuracy.