Cranberry Orange Pecan Oatmeal Cookies

Yes, I said cookies.  Cranberry Orange is one of my all-time favorite flavor combinations.  My best friend swoons at Peanut Butter and Chocolate, I swoon for Cranberry Orange.  I will try anything that purports to have this combination of flavors. Unfortunately, it is a seasonal flavor to most people, kind of like pumpkin.  My family makes Cranberry Orange bread for Christmas morning.  I try to make a few loaves during the season because it requires fresh cranberries.  I am sure you can find "fresh" cranberries out of season, but that just seems like a bad idea somehow.

To get my flavors in something other than a muffin or bread.  I decided to go in search of a cookie.  The Oracle (aka Google) led me to this recipe for Cranberry Orange Oatmeal Cookies.  Having already made 60 other oatmeal cookies today I decided to make a half of this recipe and vary it a bit, this is what I came up with:

Cranberry Orange Pecan Oatmeal Cookies
Ingredients:
1/2 C butter
3/4 C light brown sugar, firmly packed
1 egg
3/4 tsp vanilla
1/2 Tbsp grated orange peel
1/2 tsp orange extract
3/4 C A.P. flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 1/2 C rolled oats
1/2 C cranberries
1/2 C chopped pecans

Preheat oven to 350F.  Combine flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and rolled oats.  In separate bowl, beat butter and brown sugar.  Add egg, vanilla and orange peel to butter mixture.  Mix in dry ingredients.  Once combined, add orange extract. Fold in cranberries and pecans.  Bake 12 minutes in 350F oven, let sit about 3 minutes on the cookie sheet before moving to a cooling rack. Yield: about 30 cookies

Pinoche

This is the point when I went off the deep-end this Christmas season making A LOT of candy. You might've noticed in that I made 8, count 'em 8, batches of English Toffee this year! I made so many batches of candy that I made hardly any cookies.  Candy making is not for the faint of heart.  I tossed at least 2 batches of candy that just died.

Apparently pronounced pin-ooo-ch-eee this was purported to be one of Grandma's favorite recipes.  I'd never heard of it until this Christmas season.   My aunt mentioned it when I was attempting to make Cream Divinity (a top secret family recipe - trust me, you really don't want to go there).  The cream divinity attempts elicited about 2 phone calls from me to my mother who told me to call my aunt and then several calls between the 3 sisters.  The question I had: "How much is in a bottle?" (the recipe calls for 3 bottles of cream) - flashback to the days when cream was delivered to your doorstep in glass bottles.  The answer is 1/2 a pint or 1 cup (Mom for the win!).  Cream divinity is not like "normal" divinity, which I have never had.  Apparently many people dislike divinity.  I think to avoid confusion it'd be best if the whole thing was renamed Vanilla Fudge, but I think my Great Aunt Ann would spin in her grave if it was renamed or given outside the family (I heard rumors of haunting).  Aunt Ann is also responsible for *#()@)&* Sugar Cookie recipe - do you see a theme here? 

The reason no one really wants this recipe (even if I could give it out) is because it takes about 4 people with incredible arm muscles to "stir" this stuff until it's done.  Grandma would occasionally make it and a neighbor loved it and did is part to help stir.  He came one day with the brilliant idea to stir it using a drill.  It burned up the drill.  Personally, I decided to toss it in my much loved Kitchen Aid and watched the KA like a hawk for signs of overheating.  The only successful batch took over 1 hr of stirring in the mixer.  The instructions I got were beat until it's "no longer shiny" at that point, it sets up so once again you have to have your handy greased pan set and ready to go.  If it doesn't come out right, you eat it w/ a spoon instead of cutting it into pieces.  It is not appealing to wander around your neighborhood/office/friend's parties with a pan of Cream Divinity and spoons.

This leads me to Pinoche, it has the same excitement as Cream Divinity, if only slightly less beating.  I ended up tossing the first batch as I was given to understand that the milk in the recipe was evaporated milk. It's not. You use either milk or cream.  Pinoche is essentially a brown sugar fudge.  This is NOT recommended for diabetics, possible diabetics, reformed diabetics, anyone not wanting to be in a diabetic coma because it is SWEET.  It's very tasty though.

This was another one of my interesting recipes, besides the milk/evaporated milk fiasco.  The original recipe calls for "lump butter, vanilla, and cocoanut".  A lump of butter is about 2 tablespoons.  We decided that vanilla was about 1 teaspoon.  I chose not to add the coconut since I'm not a huge fan of the stuff.  I have a couple of photos of the beginning stages, I did not take pictures after it was made.

when everything meets/combines and is relatively smooth

bubbles as you get to soft ball stage - i recommend using a wooden spoon to stir, I found out the hard way that the silicone spatulas are only rated to high temps for the end, not the handle

pinoche in the mixer

Pinoche

3 C brown sugar
1 1/2 C milk, scant I used cream
Boil until it forms soft ball in cold water.
Remove from stove and add:
lump butter (2 Tbsp)
vanilla (1 tsp)
cocoanut (best guess, about 1 cup. You could also do nuts if you were so inclined)
Beat well. Pour in buttered dish.

I was told to beat until it was no longer shiny, this took about 30 to 45 minutes in a stand mixer.  I would NOT recommend trying to beat with a hand mixer.  I greased my pan w/ vegetable shortening and it worked just fine.

2012

Here we are, it's 2012.  I certainly did not make 52 different delectable confections in 2011.  I did learn a few things from last year.  Number 1, no one, not even Grandma, would slave over a hot oven in a North Carolina summer.  It's too hot and gross outside and raising the air conditioning bill even further is a bit ridiculous.  Second, writing a blog is not easy, especially if you want it to be vaguely interesting beyond the recipe; not to mention the high demand for pictures, pictures, pictures!  Getting to know Grandma, my aunts and mother through this baking adventure has been a lot of fun.  I enjoy baking as a hobby and want to learn new methods while keeping the old traditions (yes, I will probably always use a sifter).  So my goal for the next year is to keep this blog up with various baking adventures, even if they aren't always from Grandma's recipe box. 

Happy New Year!