Reems Eats

It snowed! (What does ‘it’ determine? The sky, the clouds, the weather, mother nature, God, the world? I’ve never been sure.) About five centimeters of white clotted our driveways and roads. Yeah! For once Victoria felt Canadian. Caleb and I stepped out into the world first thing. We walked a couple kilometers to a palm tree that Caleb photographed in the snow. I photographed Caleb photographing. Also, I lured him into the grocery store on the return trip. After all, on a snow day, what is there to do besides play outside and bake sugar cookies? I toted home a knapsack full of veggies and fruits and Caleb carried a bag of flour slung over one shoulder. With only two weeks to Christmas, snow on the ground, and sugar cookies dancing in my head, I knew life was perfect. Or nearly perfect, the wind was bitingly cold and the skin on my hands and face was red and chapped. I spent most of the day singing along to Christmas songs (we’ve got a whole cache of new Christmas records), mixing, rolling, and cutting dough, and crafting Christmas cards. Two varieties of sugar cookies sprang forth from my laborious activity: one, a lime drop sugar cookie, the other, a rolled sugar cookie. The second, the rolled cookie, is a play on the original sugar cookies, which, while sweet and tasty, strikes me as a tad dull, the bland face of a too beautiful model. So I jazzed, spiced and changed to develop a not-so traditional sugar cookie that includes the likes of buckwheat flour, cardamom spice, and slivered almonds. I hope you tear into these as quickly as we did! (I just ate one for breakfast).

A Not-So Traditional Sugar Cookie

Beat together:
¼ cup butter
1 TBSP olive oil
¾ cup brown sugar

Beat in:
1 TBSP apple sauce
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla

In another bowl, mix together:
1 and 1/3 cup flour
1/3 cup buckwheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
¼ tsp cardamom
¼ tsp all spice
1 tsp cinnamon

Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix until almost combined.
Then, Add:
¼ cup dried cranberries
¼ cup slivered or flaked almonds

Divide into dough in two and shape into disks. Cover dough with plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for at least I hour. Roll dough between two pieces of wax paper. Do one disk as a time, leaving the other in the fridge. Make sure to roll the dough out evenly, about ¼” thick. Cut out shapes with your favourite cookie cutters. Place on a cookie sheet and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.

Bake at 350 for 8-10 minutes. Baking time depends on the size of your cookies. Larger cookies will take slightly longer. The cookies will firm up after they’ve cooled a bit. I like soft chewy cookies, and I think this recipe tastes better as such, so I prefer a shorter baking time.