Thursday, March 25, 2010

Brown Sugar Substitute

Last night while my husband was watching TV, I was doing my usual multi-tasking, watching the shows with him, but also perusing my cooking magazines. Looking for something to make for our friends this Sabbath for lunch, as well as seeing is there was any desert I just had to make. Well, I found one: Hazelnut Espresso Cookies (see recipes - thank you Everyday Food!).

So this afternoon, after delivering a meal - and lemon cake - to my friend who just had a baby, I proceeded to get the ingredients out to make these cookies. Let me say, the kids were intent on me making desert, considering I had just dropped off aforementioned lemon cake at our friends house, and they did not get to sample any of it! As I'm bringing out the containers of flour, salt, baking soda, sugars, espresso and hazelnuts, I realize that my brown sugar jar is curiously low on brown sugar. Ack! As you may realize, baking is a science... you MUST have the ingredients in the correct proportions for the chemistry to produce the desired result. Substitutions can occur, but you may not end up with the product you wanted. So what is a girl to do, when the recipe calls for 1/2 cup of brown sugar, and there is maybe 1/4? Make it!

Yes, you heard me right. Brown sugar consists mainly of molasses and white sugar. Sure, there are other ingredients, and I'm positive they do more than mix together large amounts of white sugar and molasses, but in this case, making it was a better option than gathering the kids back in the car, in the rain, just to get brown sugar. So in a bowl I put my scant amount of true brown sugar, some white sugar, and a dollop of molasses (I just love the stuff, especially on pancakes, thanks to my dad!). I stirred it together, mashed the molasses in, and after a while, you couldn't really tell where the brown sugar ended and my additions started. Time to get started on some cookies!

By this time the boys had gotten my mixer on the counter, plugged it in, and were ready to bake. In goes the softened butter (don't take short cuts with a microwave, remember that chemistry comment earlier - melted butter will not fluff up with sugar as will softened butter), and sugars. My youngest was eager to turn on the mixer and get as close as I'll let him to watch the magic. After several minutes of mixing, in goes the eggs, then the most delicious part... ESPRESSO! I happened to have instant espresso powder on hand from a batch of tiramisu made earlier in the year, so I was eager to use in these cookies. Next the dry ingredients got mixed in, and finally the chopped hazelnuts.

The boys each got handed something to lick, and I grabbed my ice cream scoop and started to make my cookies. Baked in the oven for 10 minutes, they came out warm and delicious. I had to force myself to stop eating them. I figure it might keep me up at night! For those of you who are just dying for the recipe, check out the tab at the top, I've included it. Not sure how long they'll last in my cookie jar, may be gone by tomorrow!

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