Pumpkin Chocolate Walnut Muffins

I love making muffins. I think I've already said that before, many times, but it's true. I love how it's an easy snack, a nice quick breakfast and plus they can be really healthy. I have this one recipe I use as a base, I make them so often I know it by heart now. It's from the Healthy Oven baking book. This one here is a tweaked version.
Today I thought it was time to open the can of pumpkin and have a "pumpkin week"...And since anything goes with chocolate I decided to make them chocolate muffins.

Here's the recipe:

Dry ingredients:

1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup coco pwder, sifted.
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp EACH of nutmeg, ground cloves and ground ginger
Pinch of salt

Wet Ingredients:

1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
3/4 cup buttermilk
2/3 cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed
1 large egg
1 1/2 TBSP canola oil
1 tsp vanilla

1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Turn on the oven at 350. Spray a muffin pan with some good ol' Paaaam.
Mix all the dry ingredients in a large bowl and set aside.
In another bowl, wisk all the wet ingredients until frothy, about 2-3 minutes.
Make a well in the flour mix, pour in the wet mix and stir until just combined. Add the cocolate chips and nuts and mix in, but don't over mix.
Bake for 20-25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center of the muffin comes out clean.
Cool in the pan for 10 minutes and unmold and cool on a rack.

Makes about 10 muffins. They will be gone in 2-3 days I garantee it!
(As I type this the man of the house is having his third one today...)

Chocolate Walnut Fudge

What can I say about chocolate fudge?? Well, not much, really, except whoever discovered chocolate and the fudge principle is genius. Seriously.

I rarely make it because I don't want to gain 400 pounds, but it's Christmas, so I made a batch and will give most of it to my brother and his family. But of course I kept some, they didn't all fit in the box....Oh, too bad...
I got the recipe in the same magazine as the cherry balls. It's so simple, it's a charm to make, not too messy, and it's also easy to cut. Big plus when it comes to treats like that!
So without further ado, I give you the best fuedge in the world, and wishing you all a very Happy Christmas filled with good food and family.
Cheers!



1 1/2 cups milk chocolate chips
1 1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate vhips
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1/3 cup icing sugar
1/2 TBSP almond extract
1/2 TBSP vanilla extract
1 cup chopped walnuts.

Melt the chocolate in a bain-marie (fancy word for "stainless steel bowl over a pot of boiling water) or in a micro-wave if you a have a big enough bowl (it's A LOT of chocolate!!).
While that's going on, line a 8x8in square pan with foil and brush with butter, or margarine.
When the chocolate is all nice and smooth let it cool a bit and add the condensed milk, sugar, both extracts and a pinch of salt. Stir it until all smooth, incorporate 2/3 cup of walnuts and pour into the prepared pan.
Smoothe the top, sprinkle the rest of the walnuts, pushing them down a bit so they stick, and send it to the fridge for at least 2 hours.
Then all you need to do is lift the foil out, the fudge will come out with it, and cut into cubes with a sharp knife.
Who wouldn't love this as a gift??



The kids are gonna go crazy...(and the big kids too!!)

Cherry Brandy Chocolates

Christmas time is the perfect time to make treats like these. Last night was the swim team's Christmas party and as always we all were required to bring something..Let me just say, potlucks are the best partys! There's so much variety and you get to discover new ways of doing things. Usually at these kind of parties I always bring dessert. Or something along that way...One time I made jello shots...what, it's kinda like dessert!
Anyway, for this party I had a recipe picked out, some kind of brownies, but one night last week I was going through a special edition of "taste of home" featuring cookies and candies only, looking for something cute to bring to my brother on Christmas Eve, and I came accross these little babies. Oh My...I was instantly intrigued. Seemed relatively easy to make, with only a few simple ingredients, so I decided to make these for the swim party too. And I'm glad I did! They were a hit and (like the jello shots) I think they will be remembered...
Here's the recipe, as written in "Taste of Home; Best cookies and candies":

For about 4-5 dozen little balls, you'll need:

1/2 cup dried cherries, chopped
1/2 cup cherry brandy (may be a little hard to find, but it's worth it, and btw that brandy is amazing in Sangrias!!)
3 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 TBSP unsalted butter, softened
3 1/2 cup icing sugar (yes, it's a lot of sugar...)

6-8 ounces dark chocolate, chopped
1 TBSP shortening
White cookie icing (optional but pretty!!)

First step, the night before, soak the cherries in the brandy, cover and refrigerate overnight. I'm sure if you're pressed for time 2 hours would be enough, but the longer it soaks the softer the cherries will be, and soft is what we want here!

The next day:
In a bowl cream the butter and cream cheese until smooth. Add the sugar in batches and mix, at first with the mixer but after a while you'll have to let go and put some effort into it, with a good ol' spatula and some elbow grease. It will seem like a lot of sugar, but in the end what you're looking for is a crumbly mixture like this:



Drain the cherries (keep the liquid!! that precious brandy...), add to the sugar mix, along with 2-3 teaspoons of the soaking liquid. Mix until it come together. If you feel like you need more sugar, add more sugar; or if it's too dry more brandy ...
It will look like this:



Then it's time to make the little balls, about teaspoon fulls, roll them nicely and place them on a baking sheet lined with wax paper.



Cover with plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for 1 hour.
After one hour, melt the chocolate and shortening until smooth, and cool a bit.
Roll the balls in chocolate, covering them all around and return to the sheet. I found the best way to do this was with a spoon and a toothpick.
Finally, drizzle the white icing in a disordely fashion, and send it to fridge again, uncovered. Chill until you're ready to go.



Plate, cover, and when you get to that party make sure they stay in the fridge until ready to serve!



Merry Christmas!!

White Chocolate and Cherry Cookies.

I will have to ask you all to ignore the "healthy baking" at the top of this blog for this post. In fact, from now until after Christmas there might be more "comfort and traditional" rather than healthy and "good for you"...Hey, it's that time of year, let's indulge a bit, right? Right.
These cookies are more like the typical chocolate chip cookie, with lots of butter and sugar. I got the basic recipe in a magazine but changed the flavors a bit.

1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg
Grated zest of 1 orange
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup cacao powder, sifted
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cup white chocolate chips
3/4-1 cup dried cherries

In a large bowl, start by creaming the butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg and orange zest.
In another bowl mix the flour, baking soda, salt, and gradually add to the butter mixture in 3-4 batches and mix well. Fold in the cherries and white cocolate chips with a spatula.
Roll into balls (or drop heap teaspoonfulls if you don't like getting your hands dirty...) about 1 inch diameter, and place on an oiled cookie sheet, about 2 inches appart.
Bake at 350F for 10-12 minutes, until the edges are golden but the middle is still soft-ish. They will continue to bake for a bit even when out of the oven. Cool on the sheet for 4-5 minutes and transfer to a wire rack and cool completely.



Enjoy with a nice cup of tea, or a glass of milk...

Chocolate-Walnut Pumpkin Bread

Yes, this is another pumpkin recipe...I told you that one can was pretty big, so I gotta use it!
So. Today after a little shopping and chores around the house I decided to bake a "pumpkin something". I remembered seeing this recipe in the Holiday edition of the magazine "Taste of Home". It comes from a woman in Florida...I actually changed the recipe a bit, "tweaked" it so to speak. I thought it would be nice to have something different with pumpkin, something other than the traditional cloves/nutmeg/ginger flavors. So I thought of chocolate, and looked though my spice cabinet (that needs to be sorted out, seriously. It's a mess in there...), and Ta-da! Inspired! Cardamom! Beautiful spice. So fragrant and powerful! Try it you'll see. I know I will definetly use it more often from now on!
Anyway, about this cake...It's not a "healthy oven" recipe, so it has quite a bit of sugar and oil. But moderate indulgence is okay, right?

Dry Ingredients:
1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup coco powder, sifted
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp ground cardamom

Wet ingredients:

1 1/3 cup sugar
7.5 ounces pumpkin puree
1/2 cup canola oil
2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla extrac

1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions:

Turn the oven on at 350F and set the rack in the middle.
Spray a 9x5 loaf pan with vegetable oil.
In a medium bowl, mix the dry ingredients.
In another medium bowl, beat the wet ingredients until well blended.
Transfer the dry in the wet and gradually mix it until well blended.
Fold in the walnuts and chocolate chips.
Pour in the pan and smooth the top.
Bake for 60-70 minutes(mine took more like 70 minutes, but check after 60 just in case...overbaking=dry cake...). When it's done a knife will come out clean when inserted in the middle.

Let cool in the pan for about 10 minutes and transfer to a wire rack and let cool.



Slice and enjoy!



You can barely taste the pumpkin in this. It's all chocolate! And that cardamom, well...it's CRAZY good.

I have a feeling this will disapeer in no time...

Peanut Butter Cookies

I have to admit I've never been the biggest fan of peanut butter. I eat it on toasts that's it. When I buy a jar at the grocery store it usually lasts a long time!
I was never a huge fan of peanut flavor either, like in sauces and all. And as much as I love chocolate, the two together was never my thing. Reese's PB cups don't do anything for me. Sorry...BUT. Peanut butter cookies I like. They're so smooth and sweet and salty. The downfall of them is the amount of fat that's in there. I remember when I'd go visit my grandma she'd keep them a cookie box lined with paper towel that would get drenched in oil. The traditional recipes call for commercial peanut butter AND shortening. Not good.
SO when I found this recipe in Sarah Philips' "Healthy Oven" I had to try it. And I have to admit, they're amazing. And the fat amount is a lot less than grandma's cookies. Plus by using natural peanut butter it assures you there's NO shortening in here! (because we all know commercial PB is loaded with that shtuff...)
Today I thought I'd get over this whole "pb and chocolate" non-sense and add some chocolate on those cookies. It works nice. I admit, they go together quite nicely...but I still won't eat Reese's cups. Not when I can have these!!:



Ingredients:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt

3/4 cup natural peanut butter
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 TBSP unsalted butter at room temperature.
1 egg
1 TBSP light corn syrup
1 TBSP vanilla extract

3 ounces semi-sweet chocolate (for dipping)...(optional but recommended!!)

Preheat the oven at 350F and set the rack in the middle.
Mix the flour, baking soda and salt in a small bowl. Set aside.
In another bowl, using a mixer or a spatula (spatula in my case...my grandma never had a mixer...),beat the peanut butter, sugars and butter until well mixed. Add in the egg, corn syrup and vanilla.
Add the flour mixture in 2 batches.
*You'll notice the dough will not come together quite nicely in a big ball, but don't worry. That's ok...
Roll the "dough" into little balls, about 1 teaspoon worth for each ball. Place on an oiled cookie sheet, about 1 inch appart. With a fork, press on the dough balls to create that cute peanut butter cookie pattern we all know and love...



Bake for 8-10 minutes. Cool them on the sheet for a minute and transfer to a rack.
*If you need to make 2 batches I suggest you get the littl' balls ready while the first batch is in the oven...saves time...just saying..!



Now. To take it to the next level, melt some chocolate in the micro-wave and dip each cooled cookie until the top in coated. As I said you can skip this step but why would you??



Don't they look so cute?

Banana Chocolate Chip Bread

Whoever invented/came up with using bananas for baking is a genius. I mean, really! They're amazing for muffins, and cakes, and well, bread. And it's kinda recomforting to know that when there's 2 bananas on the counter, dying and blackening as days go by, it's not a total loss...in fact I almost, sometimes, let them "mature" on purpose, so that I have an excuse to bake something!!
So this week I was gonna, again, make muffins, but I decided to make a loaf for something different, and for some new material for this blog(yes, I'm still thinking of you, readers, even if I don't show up on here all that often..:))
This recipe came form "Healthy Oven", yet again. It uses buttermilk, but if you're unable to find buttermilk(or in my case decide at the last minute to make a loaf rather than the usual muffins...)make your own:
2/3 cup plain low-fat yogurt+1/3 cup 1% milk=1 cup buttermilk.
It's that simple, and it works!
On to the recipe:

Dry ingredients:

2 cups flour(mix half whole wheat, half all-purpose...)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp grated nutmeg
Pinch of salt

Wet ingredients:

1 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 cup mashed ripe bananas(about 2 bananas)
3/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup low-fat buttermilk
1 large egg
1 TBSP canola oil
1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup mini chocolate chips

Directions:


Mix all the dry ingredients and set aside.
Mix all the wet ingredients, by hand or with a mixer for about 2 minutes, making sure everything is well combined.
Pour the wet in the dry, add chocolate chips and mix, without over mixing though or you'll end up with a tougher loaf. In this case it's ok if there are still lumps of flour here and there...
Pour in a greased 9x5x3 loaf pan, smooth the top with a spatula and sprinkle more choco chips on top(!!!).
Bake in a 350F oven on the middle rack for 55-60 minutes.
Cool for 10 minutes while still in the pan, unmold and cool completely on a cooling rack...



or...if you have no self control like me have a few slices while it's still too hot and burn your tongue...(no seriously, don't. it hurts...)

It's an AMAZING loaf, really, even after 4 days!

White Chocolate, Fruit and Walnut Oatmeal Cookies.

It's been a while since I made cookies...and I chose the first really hot day to turn on the oven and bake some. Oh well, ...I can handle the heat...
These cookies are really nice. I took the basic recipe in the "healthy oven" book, so they're somewhat "healthier" than the usual chocolate-nut-fruit cookie. They each have about 80 calories but they taste like they're 200 calories each, they're so nice and sweet and soft. Nice way to induldge...



Ingredients:

Dry:
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole-wheat pastry flour
3/4 cup quick oats
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt

Wet:
6TBSP unsalted butter at room temperature(today it was almost melted...)
1 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 egg
1 TBSP vanilla

1/2 cup white chocolate chips
1/2 cup dried fruit mix(apricots and cranberries were used here)
1/3 cup chopped nuts(i used walnuts...)

Mix all the dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside.
Cream the butter and sugar with a mixer or by hand with a rubber spatula until nice and creamy.
Add egg and vanilla and mix until all is smooth.
Add the flour to the butter mix, in 3 parts, and with the last part throw in the fruits, nuts, and chocolate chips. Mix until combined but without overmixing.
Drop heaping teaspoonfuls on an oiled baking sheet, 1 inch appart.
Bake for 10-12 minutes(mine took 10...)
Cool on the sheet for a minute before transfering to a tray and cool completely.
This will give you about 2-3 dozen cookies.

I find the white chocolate chips is a nice twist on the oh-so-popular regular chocolate and the apricots come out nicely too!



Have a glass of milk on the side and pretend it's Christmas...

Double-Chocolate and Walnut Muffins

Muffins of the week this week are kind of like a cross between muffins and...dare I say it,... cupcakes. Before I started this blog I used to make always the same muffin recipe, changing it a bit every week, but it was always the same "base". Now, I've been trying new recipes so that a)I'd have new "material" and b)you the readers don't get bored!! I have a cook book of ONLY muffins and cookies, which I love. And that "Healthy Oven" I always talk about, where this one came from, has a lot of good muffin recipes. As always, for these I added stuff because I can't just make a recipe like it's supposed to be and I have to admit, I really have a thing for walnuts, and other types of nuts and seeds. As for the chocolate chips, well, how can you go wrong with that?!



*On a side note, when I worked in Whistler at Mogul's coffee shop where I was doing the baking(best job of my life!!)and a little cooking, we were famous for our muffins. Whistler being a ski resort, people would come in at 7 am before hitting the slopes and grab a couple of muffins for the gondola ride. I would start at 5:30am, making dozens of muffins and by noon they were usually gone. Anyway,...we had a basic recipe, kinda healthy with oats and buttermilk, dark brown sugar,.. I wish I'd written it down...anyway so we could put anything we wanted in them, to keep in interesting. One day I was gonna do choco chip, but then decided to substitute coco powder for some of the flour and make it even more chocolate(don't know why the girls before me never thought of it...). They were so good! These double chocolate muffins became MY specialty. For some reason the other baker girl never made them, or not like I did anyway. Woah ok I'm rambling...My point is these ones remind me of my double-choco muffins from Mogul's, minus the oats. I should try them with oats next time...
Here's Sarah's recipe for chocolate fudgy muffins:

Ingredients, for 10-12 muffins:

Dry:
1 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour(or all-purpose)
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder(*you can sift it but i didn't because I kina like lumpy cocoa in muffins,...but that's just me.)
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
pinch of salt

Wet:
1 ounce bittersweet or semisweet chocolate(1 square "Baker's chocolate").
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 egg
1 TBSP unsalted butter, melted
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp instant espresso or instant coffee powder

1/2 cup mini chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walunuts

-Preheat the oven at 350F, set the rack in the middle and oil spray muffin tins.
-Mix all the dry ingredients, walnuts and chocolate chips, and set aside.
-Melt the chocolate, let it cool a bit and mix in the melted butter.
-Transfer to a medium bowl, add sugar, appelsauce and all the other wet ingredients and whisk until frothy.
-Pour the wet mix in the dry mix, stir until it just comes together.
-Scoop in muffin tins and bake for 20-25 minutes.
-When they're ready they will spring back when you press on them, or do the toothpick thing...
-Cool on a rack in the pan for 10 minutes and unmold carefully.

*If it's somebody's birthday, or if you just need a treat, go for it and ice them with your favorite icing!!



The coffee powder comes out really nicely in these. So they go great with a cup of joe!!
Enjoy!

Almond-Chocolate Protein Bars.

Being a pretty active person I have to say I spend a lot of money on protein bars. Well, I should say USED TO because I found a great recipe to make them at home for 5 bucks a pan rather than 5 bucks for 2 bars with an ingredient list longer than my arm. I found this recipe here on Georgie's website. Go check it out, it's a great website with nice recipes, a lot of info about nutrition and all health related stuff!
Anyway. So as I mentionned a few posts ago, there's a big meet this week-end, out of town, so I'm planning ahead and bringing a lot of baked goods, for me and my teammates. I wonder if I can bribe the timers and judges too...? Hehe...Probably not...



Ok, so I made 2 batches of these bars, one like the original with peanut butter, and the other one I tweaked it and made it all almond. Both chocolate because I used chocolate protein powder, but I'm sure they would work with vanilla or something else. They both turned out very nice. The peanut butter one looked exactly like the original(how often does THAT happen?), and my tweaked-out version looks like a fancy chocolate dessert!



The great thing with these too is that you can freeze them and pop them in a micro-wave for 30sec after a work-out and it's good to go. Portions also may vary, I cut them into 10 bars per pan, since I want to share(!) but also for between swimming races it needs to stay "lighter"...
So, here's the recipe, I urge you all to try and make them them, it's easy and so delicious, taste almost like cake, but packed with protein and healthy fats.
Go to Georgie's site for the "original", and here's my different kinda version:

1/2 cup quick oats
1/2 cup unsweetened soy milk
1/4 cup egg whites(you can buy egg whites in a carton at the store. great for omelettes to have on hand!)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract

1/3 cup chocolate WHEY protein powder(no soy, please...there's alredy soy milk in here!)
1/2 cup granulated white sugar(or Splenda, if you have it...)
1/4 milled flax seeds
1 TBSP whole wheat pastry flour
1 1/2 TBSP ground almonds
1 TBSP cocoa powder
3/4 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt

6 TBSP almond butter
1/2 cup sliced almonds, preferably(but not necessary)toasted.

-Oven on at 350F, oil spray an 8in square pan.
-Heat oats and soymilk in microwave for 60secs. Let it cool a bit.
-Meanwhile, mix whey protein, sugar, flax mill, flour and almond mill, coco powder, baking powder and salt.
-Now the oatmeal mix should be cool enough, mix in the egg whites, vanilla and almond extract.
-Pour the wet in the dry and mix until combined but don't overmix.
-Spoon the almond butter over and spread it around with a fork.
-Sprinkle the sliced almonds on top.
-Bake for 10 minutes, the centre will still be a little jiggly but they will firm as they cool.
*Once they completely cooled, sliced and wrap in plastic to preserve freshness. Plus, it's practical to just grab out of the fridge/freezer and bring to the gym/pool for later...

Thanx again Georgie for this amazing recipe! They will now be on my weekly baking list for sure!

"Oh-My-God-I-Need-To-Sit-Down" Brownies.

I've been looking for a really good recipe for brownies. One that doesn't call for 1 cup of butter and 2 cups of sugar...I seached a lot of other food blogs, looked through my cookbooks, and in the end settled for, again, one of Sarah Philips' "Healthy Oven" recipe. I think I'd made them before, a long time ago because that page was a little dirty(sign of a good cook book...). But I didn't remember they were THAT good!
So after making sure I had all the ingredients I decided to go for it.
Now, let me warn you in advance, you MAY need to sit down to eat these. My knees buckled a bit...This is the Holy Grail of Brownies!



Ingredients:

4 TBSP melted butter, and cooled a bit.
2 ounces semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate( I used Baker's Chocolate, 1 square is 1 once)

1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour(or all-purpose...I find pastry flour better for baking, it makes everything more moist and tender.)
1/3 cup unsweetened coca powder
1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt

1 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
2 egg whites
1 TBSP canola oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp instant coffee or espresso powder

1/2 cup white chocolate chips(optional, this was my idea...)

Directions:

-Heat theoven at 350F, positon the rack in the middle of the oven. Spray an 8-inch square pan with oil.
-Melt the chocolate(in the microwave is the more convenient way), and let it cool a bit.
-In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, coca powder(may need to sift it if it's too lumpy), baking powder and salt, Set aside.
-In another bowl whisk butter, sugar, egg, egg whites, oil, vanilla, instant coffee and melted chocolate until smooth (mine was a little lumpy still)
-With a rubber spatula or spoon, add in the dry ingredients. Add choclate chips...or nuts would be good in there too!
-Pour into the baking pan and smooth the top. I added a bit more chocolate chips on the top...
-Bake until the edges pull away from the pan, EXACTLY 25 MINUTES. Also, do NOT open the oven's door while it bakes because it will deflate.
-Cool in the pan on a wire rack.



-Remember...eat them sitting down...

Cocoa-Orange Snap Cookies.

I love baking cookies. I love eating them too! With a cup of coffee or tea it's pretty hard to beat. I rarely buy them in the grocery store because a)i love baking and b)commercial cookies can have stuff in them that don't belong in food...
This recipe is also from Sarah Philips' "Healthy Oven", each cookie as approximately 50 calories. Not bad...I tweaked it a bit by adding orange zest, because orange and chocolate go together so well, and I also I'm fascinated with citrus zest.



These cookies take a bit of thinking ahead because they need to chill in the fridge for a while.
So here's the recipe: it'll give you about 30 cookies.

1 1/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/4 unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
pinch of salt

1 cup sugar(plus 2TBSP for dipping)
6 TBSP unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 egg
1 TBSP light corn syrup
1 TBSP vanilla

zest of one orange(keep 1/2 tsp for dipping)

-In a bowl, mix flour, sift in cocoa, baking powder and salt. Set aside
-In another bowl, beat sugar and butter until it starts looking like breadcrumbs(with a hand mixer is better, and quicker!!)
-Add egg, corn syrup and vanilla and beat until smooth. Add the zest and mix lightly.
-Stir in the flour mixture, in 2 batches.
-Transfer to a sheet of wax paper and shape the dough into a log, about 1 1/2-2 inch in diameter. Wrap tight and put it in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
.......
-Turn oven on at 375F, set rack in middle, oil spray a cookie sheet.
-On a small plate, mix 1-2 TBSP or so of sugar with the one half-teaspoon of zest. Mix it well, take time to crush it good so the oil gets out and the sugar becomes a little yellow.
-Cut the dough into 1/2 inch rounds, dip one side in the sugar/zest mix, put on the sheet sugar side UP(obviously...).
-Bake for 10-12 minutes.
-Let stand 5-8 minutes on tray before transfering to a cooling rack.



The cookies might seem underdone after 10 minutes but keep in mind they will keep baking for a bit once out of the oven. They're snap cookies so they'll get hard. Perfect for dunking in tea, or milk, etc.



Note to self...: try not to eat the whole stack...