Whammies are usually considered bad right? Well, this really isn't so bad. It really, really isn't.
So Christmas is coming up pretty soon so I've been trying to find a recipe that I could share with you and here's what I've come up with: (Drum roll please!) Candy Cane Thumbprint Shortbread Cookies!
I'm sorry if someone else out there has already come up with this nifty little idea. But I promise I did not steal it! I spent all week trying to figure out what in the world I was going to bake for this post and yesterday while eating a plain old shortbread cookie it popped into my head. Around this time of year shortbread is a great treat. And even better when it's a thumbprint shortbread cookie. And while looking through my cupboards the other day I noticed I had some small candy canes. I probably had bought them for my husband and then hid them for some weird reason. He's wild about candy canes. If he could he would eat all the ones I bought within a day.
Anywho; spying those candy canes was too perfect. So I decided to whip up just a small batch of shortbread to try this out.
Most people know that shortbread is a very simple recipe and takes almost no time at all to make. One of the reasons I like it so much. Haha!
What you need is this:
- Butter (1 lb)
- Cornstarch (1/2 cup)
- Flour (3 cups)
- Icing sugar (1 cup)
- Vanilla (1 tsp)
I kid you not, that is all you need to make this yummy little cookies. Now, when I said a little batch, I meant a very little batch. I actually quartered the amounts. Usually the above measurements gets me at least 3 dozen cookies, but clearly I did not want to make quite that much for this experiment. I'll be testing these out on my husband tomorrow. Shh! Don't tell him!
And if you think that the list of ingredients is nothing.... The rest is even easier. There's really nothing to it. You'll want the butter in your mixing bowl first (softened to room temperature is best) and then you just add the other ingredients until it all looks like whipped cream. Yes, that is all you have to do! Crazy simply right?
Once it's all whipped together nicely drop by the teaspoon onto a greased or lined cookie sheet and pop them in the oven at 350 degrees for 12 minutes. These don't typically spread either so you can get quite a few onto a single sheet. I also strongly recommend leaving them in for the full 12 minutes. The bottoms should be a nice golden brown when done and when they're cooled they'll be a bit crumbly.
Just a heads up though. I have had trouble once or twice with my shortbread spreading and figured out that it was because my butter was too soft. So try to avoid using melted butter. To get your butter to soften at room temperature just leave what you need out on the counter overnight and it'll be perfect for baking.
Now, I did say I was using candy canes for this didn't I? Well, let's get to those little fellas.
What I did with the candy canes was I crushed them up until they were in little bitty chunks. But not too little bitty.
And instead of just dropping my cookies onto the sheet I rolled them into balls, pressed my thumb down in the center to make a nice little indent (Huh, that must be the reason they're called thumbprint cookies. Haha!). Then I took a pinch of my candy cane bits and filled the indent. So these little bits were going to melt very nicely together.
My biggest concern with this idea is that when they cooled the candy canes would be too hard to eat with the soft shortbread. But we'll have to wait and see what my guinea pig -- I mean my husband -- says about them tomorrow. I've never made any sort of thumbprint cookie so I'm very nervous about how these turned out.
These really were an experiment. I'm hoping to make these again in the very, very near future. And by then I hope I'll have this thumbprint cookie business figured out a bit better.
They might not look super pretty (okay, maybe a little bit pretty) but they sure do smell good!
Now, were you wondering why I titled this post the way I did?
Here's why!
Remember the post I did including a picture of my very drab looking living room? Well, in case you don't (I know you might not really, really care but still) here's a link to that post:
http://little-miss-ks-cc.blogspot.ca/2015_10_01_archive.html
And why in the world did I remind you folks of that sad looking living room? Well, over the past few days I have been diligently working on a little project to improve that space. It's not quite done yet but it has made a huge improvement. My husband hasn't seen what I've finished just yet but he did get a pretty good idea of what I was working on this afternoon.
So there it is again. Now, notice that strange little nook space to the left of our tv? Yeah, that space has been bugging me since we moved into our apartment. And that was already over a year ago! How have I done nothing in all that time??
I finally couldn't stand it anymore and with just a little bit of the money I had made at my last bake sale I took Miss K to Home Depot to get some supplies. I really didn't spend much which was awesome. But then again, I really didn't need to buy very much.
This project has taken me a week because the majority of it had to be done during Miss K's naps. It also had to be done outside. Sawing and drilling make quite a mess. They also take longer when you have a cat trying to lie down in your work space looking for attention.
Remember, I'm not quite done yet with that space, but here's what it's looking like now:
The shelves are a bit crowded for now but it looks so much better than it did just a couple days ago. I'm so happy with it already! I have one more shelf that is almost ready to go up and I might have the space for one more after that. But we will see.
I plan to stain all the shelves but for now they're getting put up as they are. I can't find my can of stain anywhere and I refuse to break down and buy a new can until I'm completely and totally positive that the other one will never be found. I'm terrible that way. And cheap.
See? That double whammy wasn't bad at all! It was fun and probably delicious. I'm actually going to go and try one of those cookies now.
Good night folks!
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