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This book has cookie AND cupcake recipes, and this one is PERFECT for back to school lunches and after school snacks (or second breakfast as our homeschooler likes to call 'em!). The book recipe calls for candied dates on top, but not all kids like those, so I've left that part out- you can substitute sprinkles, cut up candies, or decorations for a topper if you want. Honestly, most kids will be happy with just the frosting on top!
As December turns Lake Eden into the North Pole, the heat is on in Hannah Swensen’s kitchen to honor two Christmas promises: baking irresistible holiday cupcakes and preventing a person who attempted murder from succeeding the second time around!
Synopsis:
While Hannah speeds through a lengthy holiday checklist, drama in town grows like Santa’s waistline on Christmas Eve. Her sister Andrea wants to stave off the blues by helping out at The Cookie Jar, Michele’s love life is becoming complicated, Lisa needs Hannah’s advice, and Delores has a Christmas secret she’s not willing to share. But nothing dampens the holiday mood more than the chilling mystery surrounding the man found near death in an abandoned storefront two doors down from Hannah’s bakery . . .
The befuddled John Doe can’t recall a thing about himself—except for his unusual knowledge of restoring antique furniture. With a smattering of clues and barely enough time to frost Christmas cookies, Hannah must solve a deadly puzzle that could leave her dashing through the snow for her life!
Features Over a Dozen Cookie and Dessert Recipes from The Cookie Jar!
Review:
This is book 26 (!!) of this sweet little series, and another winner from Joanna! FYI, book 27 is due out in February! First recommendation- have a snack nearby and do NOT read on an empty stomach, as you will soon be craving cookies and cupcakes! LOL. This isn't your traditional murder mystery, as there isn't a murder, but possibly an attempted one! It's more of trying to figure out who John Doe IS first, and then figuring out if something bad DID happen to him! It's a charming, quick read, and features some AMAZING recipes, that I will be baking this holiday season for sure-especially the devine and easy German Chocolate Cake and Blue Apple Pie!! So your second recommendation is you might want the print form of this book for all the wow recipes!
Recipe:
SUGAR PLUM COOKIES
Hannah’s 1st Note: If you plan to make these cookies in the morning , get out 4 sticks of butter on the night before, unwrap them, and put them in a bowl covered with plastic wrap. That way the butter will be soft enough to use in the morning.
Cookie Ingredients:
2 cups powdered (confectioners) sugar
(don’t sift unless it’s got big lumps and pack it down when you measure it)
2 cups softened, salted butter (4 sticks, 16 ounces, 1 pound)
1 cup white (granulated) sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg (freshly grated is best, of course)
1 teaspoon salt
4 and ¼ cups flour (pack down in the cup when you measure it)
toppings, if desired
Frosting Ingredients:
½ cup (¼ stick, 4 ounces) softened, salted butter
8-ounce package softened cream cheese (the brick kind, NOT whipped)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 cups confectioners (powdered) sugar
Food coloring/icing color, if desired
Cookie Directions:
1. Prepare your cookie sheets by spraying them with Pam or another nonstick baking spray or lining them with parchment paper.
Hannah’s 2nd Note: These cookies are easy to mix up if you use an electric mixer like the one Lisa and I have at The Cookie Jar. You can mix them by hand, but it will take more time and more muscle.
2. Measure out the powdered sugar and put it in the bowl of an electric mixer. Arrange the 4 sticks of softened butter on top of the powdered sugar. Sprinkle the cup of white (granulated) sugar on top of the butter. Turn the mixer on to LOW speed and mix the sugars and butter together.
3. Continue mixing on LOW speed until everything is thoroughly combined and the mixture is a uniform color.
4. Mix in the eggs at LOW speed, one at a time, mixing after each egg is added.
5. With the mixer still running at LOW speed, mix in the vanilla extract.
6. Add the baking soda and mix it in thoroughly.
7. Again, at LOW speed, mix in the cream of tartar. Mix thoroughly.
Hannah’s 3rd Note: In case you’re wondering , the addition of cream of tartar makes your cookies smoother (at least that’s what Great-Grandma Elsa told me when I asked.)
8. Add the ground cinnamon, ground nutmeg, and salt. Mix them in thoroughly.
9. Add the flour in one-cup increments, mixing after each addition. You can add the quarter cup of flour with the last full cup.
Hannah’s 4th Note: Whatever you do, don’t try to add all the flour at once. If you do that , when you start the mixer it will fly out of the bowl and all over your kitchen counter and floor. (And please don’t ask me how I know this.)
10. Turn off the mixer, scrape down the sides of the bowl, and take the mixing bowl out of the mixer. Give your cookie dough a final stir by hand with a mixing spoon.
Hannah’s 5th Note: This recipe makes from 8 to 10 dozen cookies. If you don’t want to make that many Sugar Plum Cookies , round your cookie dough into a ball and cut it in half. Place one half in a freezer bag and stick it in the refrigerator to bake in a week or so, or in the freezer to bake in a month or so. You can use the saved half of the cookie dough to bake more Sugar Plum Cookies or you can roll cookie dough balls and make Grandma Knudson’s Cinful Sugar Cookies.
11. Use your impeccably clean hands to roll the first half of the cookie dough into balls that are approximately one inch in diameter. Place the dough balls on the cookie sheets you’ve prepared, 12 cookies on each standard-sized cookie sheet.
12. Flatten the dough balls with the back of a metal spatula or the palm of your impeccably clean hand.
Hannah’s 6th Note: The flatter your cookie dough balls are, the bigger and crisper your cookies will be. Since you will be frosting these cookies, I’d suggest that you DO NOT completely flatten the balls or they might break when you frost them.
13. Bake at 325 degrees F. for 10 to 15 minutes. (The cookies should have a tinge of gold on the top.) When your cookies have baked, take them out of the oven and set them on a cold stovetop burner or a wire rack. Cool your Cookies on the cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then remove them from the cookie sheet and place them on a wire rack to finish cooling completely, and go start your frosting.
Frosting Directions:
1. Mix the softened butter with the softened cream cheese and the vanilla extract until the mixture is smooth.
Hannah’s 1st Note: If you heated the cream cheese or the butter to soften it, make sure it’s cooled down to room temperature before you mix them together.
2. Add the confectioners sugar in half-cup increments until the frosting is of proper spreading consistency. (You’ll use all, or almost all, of the sugar.)
Note: If you want colored frosting, now is the type to add your food coloring or icing coloring, to the frosting.
Decorating the Cookies:
1. With a frosting knife (or rubber spatula if you prefer), drop a dollop of frosting in the center of a cookie. Spread the dollop out to cover almost all of the cookie, but don’t go all the way to the edge.
Hannah’s 2nd Note: If you spread the frosting out all the way, it makes the cookies more difficult to pick up from a platter.
2. Once cookie has been frosted, place your decoration on top, in the center. Since the frosting has not yet hardened, the decoration will stay in place.
Yield: approximately 4 dozen buttery, sugary cookies.
About the Author:
Like Hannah Swensen, Joanne Fluke grew up in a small town in rural Minnesota where her neighbors were friendly, the winters were fierce, and the biggest scandal was the spotting of unidentified male undergarments on a young widow's clothesline. She insists that there really are 10,000 lakes and the mosquito is NOT the state bird.
While pursuing her writing career, Joanne has worked as: a public school teacher, a psychologist, a musician, a private detective's assistant, a corporate, legal, and pharmaceutical secretary, a short order cook, a florist's assistant, a caterer and party planner, a computer consultant on a now-defunct operating system, a production assistant on a TV quiz show, half of a screenwriting team with her husband, and a mother, wife, and homemaker.
She now lives in Southern California with her husband, her kids, his kids, their three dogs, one elderly tabby, and several noisy rats in the attic. Visit her website for more info (and recipes!
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