24 April 2015

Cookie Love by Mindy Segal with Kate Leahy Cookbook Review!


Book Details
Hardcover: 296 pages
Publisher: Ten Speed Press (April 7, 2015)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1607746816
ISBN-13: 978-1607746812

The Book

Mindy Segal is an up-and-coming chef and baker who's serious about cookies and bars. In her first cookbook, Segal turns classic recipes into more elevated, fun interpretations of everyone's favorite sweet treat. From Brown Butter with Hickory Smoked Bacon Chocolate Chip Cookies and Crème de Violet Snickerdoodles, to Citrus, Brown Butter, and Graham Cracker Shortbread with Framboise Preserves and Hibiscus Sugar Rugelach, Segal's recipes are inspired and far from expected. This modern twist on a traditional favorite is the perfect addition to every baker's bookshelf.

About the Author(s)


Pastry creator MINDY SEGAL specializes in contemporary American cuisine, putting a modern twist on traditional classics. The James Beard Foundation nominated her for Outstanding Pastry Chef in the country five years in a row, and she has been featured in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Food & Wine, and O, the Oprah magazine, as well as made appearances on television, including Today and the Food Network . Mindy is the proprietor of Chicago's popular HotChocolate Restaurant and Dessert Bar.

KATE LEAHY is a freelance writer and recipe developer based in the San Francisco Bay Area. She co-authored SPQR, The Preservation Kitchen, and A16 Food + Wine, the 2009 IACP Cookbook of the Year.

My Thoughts

Cookie Love is just that, cookies that you can love and they can become your go to recipes. This book has recipes that range from drop cookies to bar cookies, with favorites such as Chocolate Chip and Peanut Butter Cookies. I made the Classic Chocolate Chip cookies and they were to die for! Not only are there recipes but there are tips and what to have as staples in your pantry. You will learn about the different types of cocoa, different dairy products and even a recipe on how to make your own butter. You can learn about any item that you can use in a good cookie recipe, vanilla, cane sugar, brown sugar, sea salt and so much more. Then at the back of the book are the Tricks of the Trade where the author tells us how to measure ingredients, on dough, on baking and decorating cookies.

I think that this cookbook should be in everyones collection. Gorgeous pictures, concise and easy recipes that will be family favorites. I just love this book and intend to make more recipes from it in the future, such as the sample recipe listed below.

I received this book for review from Blogging for Books and was not monetarily compensated for said review.

Sample Recipe from Amazon
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Oatmeal Scotchies
makes approximately 42 cookies

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons old-fashioned oats 
1 cup (8 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature 
½ cup cane sugar 
½ cup firmly packed light brown sugar 
½ cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
1 extra-large egg, at room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
½ cup cake flour 
½ cup unbleached all-purpose flour 
1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon sea salt flakes
1 cup (6 ounces) butterscotch chips

There is one cookie that I cannot make: oatmeal raisin. When I was in culinary school, I spent a week trying to produce the perfect oatmeal raisin cookie. I was on a quest to make it flat and crisp, but it never worked out. The raisins always dried out or the cookies turned flabby. I finally set this cookie aside and moved on. 

Yet two sources of inspiration drove me to revisit the oatmeal-cookie category. Three Sisters Garden in Kankakee, Illinois, sells unhulled oats that look like barley malt and I wanted to highlight these special oats in a cookie. Then along came my second source of inspiration. Luke LeFiles, a Carolina boy, managed the bar at Hot Chocolate for years. He constantly put in requests for oatmeal scotchies, the butterscotch-filled chewy cookies he remembered from home. One day I realized that swapping out raisins in exchange for butterscotch would solve my flabby oatmeal cookie problem: The butterscotch complemented the oats, and the batter baked like an oatmeal lace cookie.

Whether you have unhulled oats from a farm or old-fashioned oats from the grocery store, toasting oats before baking them draws out the flavor. I take a small amount of the toasted oats and grind them in a spice grinder to enhance the cookie’s delicate texture. For a variation of this recipe, use shards of Toffee (page 250) in place of butterscotch chips.
Heat the oven to 350°F and line a couple of half sheet (13 by 18-inch) pans with parchment paper.
Spread the oats across a third half sheet pan and toast lightly until the oats smell like cooked oatmeal, approximately 
5 minutes. (Keep the oven on for the cookies.) Let cool. In a spice grinder, grind 2 tablespoons of the oats into a fine powder.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, mix the butter briefly on medium speed for 5 to 
10 seconds. Add the sugars and beat until the butter mixture is aerated and pale in color, approximately 4 minutes. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula to bring the batter together.

Crack the egg into a small cup or bowl and add the vanilla. 

Place the powdered and whole oats, flours, baking soda, and salts in a bowl and whisk to combine. Add the butterscotch chips and stir until lightly coated in flour.

On medium speed, add the egg and vanilla to the butter mixture and mix until the batter resembles cottage cheese, approximately 5 seconds. With a rubber spatula, scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl to bring the batter together. Mix on medium speed for another 20 seconds to make nearly homogeneous.

Add the dry ingredients all at once and mix on low speed until the batter comes together but still looks shaggy, approximately 30 seconds. Do not overmix. Remove the bowl from the stand mixer. With a plastic bench scraper, bring the dough completely together by hand.

Portion the dough into 8 mounds using a ¾-ounce (1 ½-tablespoon) ice cream scoop and evenly distribute onto a prepared sheet pan. (The cookies will spread significantly as they bake.)
Bake for 8 minutes. Give the pan a sturdy tap against the counter or the oven to deflate the cookies. Rotate the pan and continue to bake until the edges are a deep golden brown, the centers have fallen, and the cookies are beginning to crisp and brown, another 4 to 6 minutes (Do not underbake or the cookies won’t crisp up when they cool.) Let the cookies cool completely on the pan. Repeat with the remaining dough.

The cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up 

to 3 days. The cookies are best when baked the day the dough is made.

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