Dorie's Cookies by Dorie Greenspan

[blue_dolphin]

My copy of Dorie's Cookies arrived today and it looks great.  I don't even drink milk but I wanted to pour myself a big cold glass and curl up with this book.  It was a struggle to finish reading the introduction before jumping around to read the lists of recipes in each chapter.  

 

Up front, there are helpful sections on technique, ingredients and gear.  Each recipe includes a note on storing both the dough (if appropriate) and the finished cookies.  And for anyone unfamiliar with Dorie, she's firmly in the weights/metric camp when it comes to measurements.  Cup and ounce measurements are generally given as well.  Teaspoon and tablespoons are used for small quantities.

 

I said I wanted a glass of milk with this book but there's a whole chapter titled "Cocktail Cookies" so a glass of wine might be equally appropriate.  

Here are a few from that chapter that caught my eye:

Goat Cheese & Chive Cookies!

Cranberry Five-Spice Cookies!

Hot and Spicy Togarashi Meringues (who even dreams like this )!!!!

Rosemary-Parm Cookies!

Fennel-Orange Shortbread Wedges!

Cocktail Puffs (I see a variation with tomato chutney in my future)!

Chocolate-Olive Cookies (I can't imagine )

Honey-Blue Cheese Madeleines!

Anytime Tarragon-Apricot Cookies!

Bee's Sneeze Nuggets (yes, with lemon, honey and GIN )!

Major Grey's Roll-ups!

Cocoa-Cayenne Cookies!

 

Then, there's the chapter of recipes from Beurre & Sel, the cookie boutique Dorie and her son ran together for a number of years.  Oh my, there are recipes in every chapter that are calling my name - it's deafening!  The Cocoa-Tahini Cookies with Sesame Crunch in the Cookies for Every Day, Any Day sound delicious. The chapter on Brownies, Bars, Break-Ups & Biscotti has a recipe for Blueberry-Buttermilk Pie Bars that looks really good.  There's a chapter on Cookies for Weekends, Holidays and Other Celebrations and a section at the end with recipes for syrups, glazes, frostings and other toppings.

 

 As in other cookbooks, Dorie includes "Playing Around" notes in some of the recipes that end up converting one recipe into many variations.  I love the idea of substituting fresh chopped lemon verbena leaves for the chives in the Goat Cheese & Chive cookies.

 

Where shall I start?  Hmmmm.  I have some jalapeño-honey chèvre that might make another variation on the Goat Cheese & Chive Cookies.   Hmmmm. 

Edited October 25, 2016 by blue_dolphin
typo (log)

[Cyberider]

Am looking forward to my copy.  I caved in and bought it so I could get free shipping on some other stuff I needed.

[Anna N]

Whew.   This one at least is unlikely to do any damage to my bank account.   I love Dorie but the only cookies I generally make are for my son-in-law's marketing meeting and his people are such traditionalists that most of these cookies would Incite a rush to the vending machine!   But that still leaves an awful lot of books on my wish list.  And I shall happily follow all your adventures.

[MelissaH]

I picked up my copy today. It's torture, because it must remain unread until next week: I have too much work to do before heading to a conference.

[FrogPrincesse]

This is a bit ridiculous and semi-impossible to resist - she has 10 recipes for brownies apparently, and that is just the beginning. A recipe for Leckerli which is a gingerbread-type cookie from Basel I've been obsessed about. And all these incredible sounding cocktail cookies... 248 recipes total according to Eat Your Books. I really don't need another cookbook, but I've added this one to the wish list!

Edited October 26, 2016 by FrogPrincesse (log)

[Tri2Cook]

I'm trying to convince myself to not even look this one up on amazon. I know if I do, it'll end up in the cart or wish list. I'm hoping to steer myself mostly away from cookies this holiday season and give something else a try so I think the last thing I need is a great big new book full of cookie recipes.

[Shelby]

14 hours ago, Tri2Cook said:

I'm trying to convince myself to not even look this one up on amazon. I know if I do, it'll end up in the cart or wish list. I'm hoping to steer myself mostly away from cookies this holiday season and give something else a try so I think the last thing I need is a great big new book full of cookie recipes.

I don't need this book.

I am trying to downsize my life.

I don't need this book.

I don't need this book.

I don't need this book.

 

Can't wait to see your creations, BD!  And, everyone else  

[BeeZee]

it is indexed on Eat Your Books. Very tempting.

[FrogPrincesse]

 

1 hour ago, BeeZee said:

it is indexed on Eat Your Books. Very tempting.

It is, and 51 people already own the book! Also there is a large portion of the book on preview on amazon.

My own copy is arriving on Saturday. I pressed the buy button last night!

 

She wrote that it is the book she had been wanting to write since she began writing cookbooks 25 years ago, so it's absolutely packed full of recipes. I justified the purchase telling myself I bought it for my daughter so she can have new cookies as a snack every week, and maybe she will be inspired to bake some of them with me...

[blue_dolphin]

1 hour ago, Shelby said:

...I am trying to downsize my life.

 

Well, since you mention downsizing, I should point out that many of the cookies in the book are very small .  Really.  She mentions that all the cookies made for her shop, Beurre et Sel, are 2 inches in diameter.  There are recipes call for 1.25" diameter cutters, which I think should be nice for those rich goat cheese cocktail cookies.  And there's a tiny two-bite-1 chip cookie where you press a single chocolate chip into a little ball of dough.  

Of course, there are sturdy bar cookies and big rich gooey-looking cookies, too.  

But if you're looking to downsize your cookies, this could be just the ticket !

Edited October 27, 2016 by blue_dolphin
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[Cyberider]

I can see from the comments that everyone needs this book as much as I do.  On that note, I ordered about ten days ago and Amazon still hasn't shipped it. 

[blue_dolphin]

Another group of recipes from the book that appeals to me are the "Jammers," sort of elevated thumbprint cookies with a 2-inch shortbread base, a little 1/2 teaspoon dollop of jam or preserves, surrounded by a circle of streusel topping.  She constructs and bakes them in either baking rings or muffin tins.  Here's a recipe for Beurre & Sel's Port Jammer Cookies from Food52.  I look forward to playing around with some of the preserves I've made.  Like lime marmalade with a coconut and macadamia streusel on a shortbread base enhanced with a little lime zest????  

[Anna N]

3 hours ago, FrogPrincesse said:

 

It is, and 51 people already own the book! Also there is a large portion of the book on preview on amazon.

My own copy is arriving on Saturday. I pressed the buy button last night!

 

She wrote that it is the book she had been wanting to write since she began writing cookbooks 25 years ago, so it's absolutely packed full of recipes. I justified the purchase telling myself I bought it for my daughter so she can have new cookies as a snack every week, and maybe she will be inspired to bake some of them with me...

Ah, @FrogPrincesse, you can obviously rationalize and enable with the best of us.  But I'm still not even a little tempted.

[Anna N]

2 hours ago, blue_dolphin said:

Another group of recipes from the book that appeals to me are the "Jammers," sort of elevated thumbprint cookies with a 2-inch shortbread base, a little 1/2 teaspoon dollop of jam or preserves, surrounded by a circle of streusel topping.  She constructs and bakes them in either baking rings or muffin tins.  Here's a recipe for Beurre & Sel's Port Jammer Cookies from Food52.  I look forward to playing around with some of the preserves I've made.  Like lime marmalade with a coconut and macadamia streusel on a shortbread base enhanced with a little lime zest????  

Stop t!

[blue_dolphin]

[ChrisTaylor]

I've caved. Having a step-daughter gives me an excuse to get into baking. All those lunchboxes that need to be filled.

[FrogPrincesse]

Now that I have the book, I am wondering what recipe to begin with!

 

It's a very heavy book by the way, square format, over 500 pages. It's a minor detail but I don't care much for the thinner and glossy paper it's printed on. It makes me paranoid that I am going to rip one of the pages if I am not careful. Also the look of the book is a bit plain. I think they could have done a bit better to make it more visually appealing. But again, these are minor details of little importance if the content is good!

Edited October 30, 2016 by FrogPrincesse
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[FrogPrincesse]

Two-bite one-chip cookies

 

 

 

Edited November 8, 2016 by FrogPrincesse
added link to recipe (log)

[cakewalk]

They look lovely. But that's essentially a chocolate chip cookie without any chocolate chips. What's the point? I know everyone is all head-over-heels about this book, but I don't really get it. I looked through the Amazon pages and was not taken by it at all. I find a lot of repetition, and not so many cookies that don't already exist, either in her own books or in hundreds of other books. She does not seem to offer anything groundbreaking or even new. I understand the desire to have yet another cook book, I succumb to it quite often myself. I have Baking from My Home to Yours and Around My French Table, and I like them both well enough. But this new one just isn't doing it for me. (She has good timing, though, publishing right before Christmas.)

[blue_dolphin]

49 minutes ago, cakewalk said:

They look lovely. But that's essentially a chocolate chip cookie without any chocolate chips. What's the point?

Sounds like they are not your cup of tea, but I thought the teeny tiny cookies with just one chocolate chip in each sounded very cute.

 

Also great that you were able to determine the book is of no interest before spending any money on it - sounds like a wise decision for you.

For me, the chapter on cocktail cookies (I don't have a ton of books with savory cookie or cracker recipes) and the Beurre & Sel recipes are worth the price of admission. 

[Anna N]

I honestly didn't succumb but got "succumbed".   Somebody very generously put it on to my Kindle. I looked up the recipe for these "two bite one chip cookies" and found them quite amusing.  I could see making them when my supply of chocolate chips is sparse. But the other thing I like about the idea is that when I make chocolate chip cookies I find some cookies have far too many chips and some not nearly enough and this would seem to address that problem neatly.  But, as always, to each their own.  

[FrogPrincesse]

They are cute cookies, super easy to make, and the chocolate chip in the middle is like a surprise. I have two cookie monsters in the house and they liked them!

[BetD]

It was the whole chapter on Cocktail Cookies that sucked me in.... I love savory over sweet most any day.

[Tri2Cook]

5 hours ago, cakewalk said:

They look lovely. But that's essentially a chocolate chip cookie without any chocolate chips. What's the point?

I haven't been tempted by this book enough to buy it yet but the point for me would be, when there are chocolate chip cookies available, I tend to seek the ones with the least chips in them. The cookie part is my favorite part. Just like when my grandmother made her oatmeal raisin cookies, I'd always search for the ones with the least raisins. Just personal preference.

[cakewalk]

3 hours ago, Tri2Cook said:

I haven't been tempted by this book enough to buy it yet but the point for me would be, when there are chocolate chip cookies available, I tend to seek the ones with the least chips in them. The cookie part is my favorite part. Just like when my grandmother made her oatmeal raisin cookies, I'd always search for the ones with the least raisins. Just personal preference.

Interesting. Personal preference, of course. But it's always possible to use your favorite chocolate chip recipe (or oatmeal raisin recipe) and just, well, put fewer - or no - chocolate chips (or raisins) in it. I'm guessing that everyone on this forum could figure that out without Dorie! I'm sure we adapt recipes to our own tastes all the time. I would have been more inclined to buy a smaller-scale book that included just the savories. But at this stage anything she publishes will create major sales, so I can't blame her for going full tilt. I don't share (or understand) the enthusiasm of others for it, but if people like it, then they like it.