Just What The Dr. Ordered

My best friend came over Saturday and it was just what the Dr ordered after such a crazy week. We decided to make cookies and after 10 mins we were back to being the same old crazy girls we were in elementary school!

To give you an idea here is a favorite picture of us from the night of my wedding rehearsal.

I have the perfect book for making cookies

It's a behemoth to say the least; 320 pages, 150 recipes and I think it weights more than Amber!

After a lot of giggling we decided on making Finnish Spice Cookies.

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger

1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

2/3 cup packed light brown sugar

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3 to 5 tablespoons how water

Royal Icing (recipe follow)

1) Place flour, ginger, cinnamon, cardamom and cloves in medium bowl; stir to combine.

2) Beat butter then brown sugar in a large bowl until light and fluffy. Dissolve baking soda in 3 tablespoons water. Beat into butter mixture. Gradually add flour mixture. Beat until dough firms. (If dough is too crumbly, add more water, 1 tablespoon at a time, until dough holds together.) Form dough into 2 discs; wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm, 30 minutes or overnight. (we did a little over 30 min for one and it was perfect left the other in longer it was really hard and I didn't like working with it as much as the first.)

3) Preheat oven to 375 F Grease cookie sheets; set aside

4) Working with one disc at a time, roll out dough on lightly floured surface to 1/8-inch thickness. Cut dough with floured 3-inch pig shaped cookie cutter or desired cookie cutter. Place cutout 1 inch apart on prepared cookie sheets. Gently press dough trimmings back together; reroll and cut out more cookies.

5) Bake 8 to 10 minutes or until firm and lightly browned. Remove cookies to wire racks; cool completely

6) Prepare Royal Icing. Spoon into pastry bag fitted with writing tip. (or any plastic ziplock/sandwich bag and cut a tiny bit of the tip off the bigger the hole the more comes out) Decorate cooled cookies with icing. Let stand at room temperature 1 hour or until set. Store tightly covered at room temperature or freeze up to 3 months. Makes about 5 dozen cookies

Royal Icing: Beat 1 room-temperature egg white with electric mixer at high speed until foamy. Gradually add 2 cups sifted powdered sugar and 1/2 teaspoon almond extract; beat at low speed until moistened. Increase mixer to high and beat until icing is stiff. (Beat in up to 1/2 cup additional powdered sugar if necessary to reach proper consistency)

My Notes: Its a very easy recipe but like the name says they are very spicy the frosting is a a good contrasting flavor. I like them; they are like a ginger snap's exotic cousin. Royal Icing can be a pain, really beat your egg! The trick is to make the icing when you're ready to use it. If it gets to stiff or its not sticking to the cookie you can microwave it for 20 sec that seems to fix it for me (it also helps if you have warm hands). I baked mine for 9 min on baking stones.

Here are the ones that haven't been eaten :)

They actually came out pretty well for all of our goofing around and it was so much fun!

I think I might be making these next!!!

Hope you all had a great weekend! Amber is doing well she's been non stop talking except when we try to video her! We have some more calls to make on Monday about her Friday appointment. Hopefully we'll have a quiet week till then!