Pfefferneuse Cookies

I don't sprechen much Deutsch so while due diligence has been done on spelling and noun morphology, please forgive the errors that certainly remain.

When I told my husband that I planned to make pfeffernuse (pronounced feffer-noose), he looked alarmed.  I think he related the name to the famous German game meat stew hasenpfeffer and thought I was proposing he eat rabbit-meat cookies.

What the two recipes have in common is pfeffer, "pepper" (not rabbit, hasen).  These are little spice cookies that do indeed include pepper along with cinnamon, cloves and candied citrus peel.  This the traditional "peppernut" flavor combination, but you can use this recipe as a jumping-off point for several flavor variations which I'll include at the end of the recipe.  I've made some of these variations before, and some are notes for things to try in the future.  The original recipe is from Reader's Digest's "A Family Christmas".

They are the perfect make-ahead holiday cookie as they must be baked 2-3 weeks before eating.  They come out of the oven hard but soften with storage.  They are ideal if you want to make holiday cookies but don't want to be baking in the thick of December.

Today's I Screw Up So You Don't Have To...when you toss the cookies with confectioners sugar at the end, don't knock excess sugar off the cookies by throwing them on the floor.  Or by letting a 3yo help you with that step. 

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Filbertines

This recipe is from A Family Christmas, a hodge-podge sort of book from Reader's Digest that has Christmas stories, crafts, menus, recipes, poems, essays and other Christmas-related oddments in it.  The cookie section is hands-down the best bunch of Christmas cookie recipes I know of.  Lots of easy to make, shippable cookies that just sing "Winter!"  This cookie is very suitable for shipping as well as for prepping ahead and freezing.  Freeze the cookie dough balls after they've been rolled in chopped filberts, and thaw them while you preheat the oven when you're ready to bake.

Filberts, also known as hazelnuts, are delicious little guys.  They have a sweet, unusually spicy sort of aroma in the oven.  They're a pain to crack out of the shells, but I was pleased and surprised to find chopped hazelnuts in the baking aisle at my grocery store.  And for about the same price as walnuts and pecans!  If you have food allergies to work around, you can use another type of nut.

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Pork Chops and Split Peas with nutrition info

I usually don't plan meals with an eagle eye on nutritional information.  I try to plan a balanced menu over the week that consists largely of fruits/veggies, whole grains and lean protein, but I don't count calories or carbs or fat grams per se.  However, I'm prepping some meals for loved ones with a constellation of health issues and food allergies, so I'm paying closer attention than usual to the nutritional details of my recipes.  I'll be including with the next several recipes the nutrional breakdown as determined by using the calorie calculator from http://www.sparkrecipes.com/.

A lot of the recipes I'm preparing are adapted from the South Beach Diet cookbooks.  While we are not strict SBD adherents any more, there's a lot to be said for these cookbooks and for the notion that eating well is not hard or tricky, but merely a matter of eating more nutrient-packed green and less nutrient-deficient white (though I do think SBD could be more attentive to sodium content and rely on fewer Miracles of Modern Chemistry to achieve its low-carb goal).  At least, that's what I take away from SBD. 

So, first up is Bolivian Pork Chops and Split Peas.  The menu is from the SBD cookbook, but the recipes have been significantly overhauled to make them easier to prepare, less killer-spicy and more freezer-friendly.
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Chai Spiced Rice Krispie Treats

My husband complains that I do "weird" things to familiar foods and don't warn him, so his mouth expects the usual flavor but is instead hit with something surprising (and delicious, I might add).  His tastebuds don't like surprises apparently.  The cocoa powder here is mostly to warn your tastebuds via your eyeballs that these are not run-of-the-mill Rice Krispie Treats.
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Green smoothie

I have been scheming ways to get more vegetables onto our snacking menu, and I now give you Green  (honeydew-spinach) Smoothies.  No, it does not taste like spinach.  I promise.  It tastes like sweet honeydew lightly accented with cardamom. 

I recommend scoping out your produce section to see if they have a "clearance" area.  I rescued a container of pre-chunked honeydew that was on its last good day (and was thusly discounted); this is the BEST fruit for this type of recipe because it is super-duper ripe, soft and sweet.  And on sale, ka-ching!  And you're saving perfectly good produce from being thrown away.  Fruit rescue perhaps isn't as emotionally fulfilling as animal rescue, say, but it does put me in a dancing mood.

You want to get the spinach pureed as smoothly as possible so the texture doesn't rat you out.  I did pretty well with pureeing the spinach with the honeydew, but next time I'd zap the spinach in the microwave for a few seconds to make sure it's really soft and whiz it in the food processor by itself first to get it even smoother.  My instructions reflect that planned change of procedure.  As with the other smoothie recipe detailed on this blog, you'll need 2 or 3 ice cube trays to freeze the mixture.

Honeydew-Spinach Smoothies
Makes 7 toddler-size smoothies or about 3 adult-size smoothies

1 10-oz. box frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed dry
1 cup apple juice
1 lb. cubed very ripe honeydew (about 4 cups)
1/4 cup sugar
3/4 tsp cardamom
1 cup vanilla yogurt

Put thawed, squeezed spinach in a microwave-safe container and zap for about 10 seconds.  Squeeze again.  Put spinach in a food processor and add a tbsp or so of apple juice.  Puree until very smooth.  Add honeydew and puree again until smooth.  Add cardmom, sugar and yogurt and puree again.  Pour mixture into a container with a pouring spout and stir in the remaining apple juice.  Pour into ice cube trays and freeze.



Kitchen Assistant (optional)

 To make a smoothie: Put 3-4 cubes in a blender with 1/2 cup water (for a toddler portion), or 6-8 cubes with 1 cup water (for an adult portion).  Blend and serve. Pin It