Brown Sugar Cookies with Nordic Ware Cookie Stamps

Brown Sugar Sugar Cookies with Nordic Ware Cookie Stamps

Jazz up your cookies with these Nordic Ware Geo Cookie Stamps!

I'm not much of a decorator and don't have a passion to decorate my cookies or cakes. Hence, my love of the ultra easy Bundt cake! Well, Nordic Ware has created a great way to easily decorate cookies with these awesome Geo Cookie Stamps and they sent me a set to try!

Making these cookies is almost too easy. Make the dough, chill, roll out golf ball size balls...and press! These were made with a brown sugar, sugar cookie dough.


It's important to place these on an ungreased cookie sheet! I'm so accustomed to laying out a piece of parchment (I buy it in cases of 1,000 sheets so I have lots of parchment on hand) that I tried it with parchment. Well, believe me when I say that wasn't the best idea as I had to peel the dough off the cookie stamp. When I tried it without the parchment, it worked like a charm! The cookie stuck to the pan so I could easily peel off the cookie stamp.

Nordic Ware sent me this Big Sheet baking tray too. If your oven is wide, this will make baking much easier as it fits more cookies! Professional made aluminum pans are the way to go when baking cookies, and these baking sheets give you evenly browned cookies.


The cookie stamps are made with heavy cast aluminum and have wooden handles. Aren't they pretty?! You should lightly grease, oil with a brush, or spray the cookie stamp before starting to press. I gave them a quick spray with baking spray.


I can see kids having a really good time making these cookies with the family. You could make a batch of peanut butter and sugar cookie doughs and let them go to town. I put a few sprinkles on some of the cookies, and left some plain. The design on the stamps are just so pretty that leaving them plain really showed off the ridges.

These are the Geo Cookie Stamps set of three. Nordic Ware also sells the All Season Cookie Stamp set and the Holiday Cookie Stamp set. I've seen the Holiday set for sale at Target too. I imagine those make very festive cookies without having to break out to royal icing. Win!

You can decorate the cookies with sprinkles, colorful nonpareils, colored sugar, or silver dragees (dragees aren't sold in California...friends from the East Coast ship them to me).


Thanks Nordic Ware Nordic Ware for sending me these Cookie Stamps! They make decorating cookies super easy. I'm looking forward to making peanut butter cookies - forget the boring fork cross-hatch, these will look so much better!

Recipe: Brown Sugar Sugar Cookies

Ingredients:
2 sticks (1 cup) butter at room temperature
1 cup (200 grams) light brown sugar
1 egg at room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 2/3 cup (372 grams) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
Sprinkles, colored sugar, or other decorations

Directions:
1. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
2. Using a stand mixer with paddle attachment, cream together butter and brown sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla, and beat until combined.
3. With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture and mix until incorporated.
4. Wrap dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2-3 hours or overnight.
5. When you are ready to bake...
6. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
7. Make golf ball size balls of dough and place on ungreased cookie sheet.
8. Stamp with the Nordic Ware Cookie Stamp. Decorate with sprinkles, if desired.
9. Bake until golden brown, about 10-12 minutes. Cool on a cookie rack.

Disclosure: The family-owned Nordic Ware company, located in Minneapolis, provided me with the Cookie Stamps and Baking Sheet. Opinions about the products are my own. And, as you know by my Bundt pan obsession, I mean collection, I'm a super fan of Nordic Ware!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt - Get ready for National Bundt Day!

Hello!

Just a quick post to tell you to grab your favorite Bundt pan! It's National Bundt Day on November 15th. You know me, I Like Big Bundts and I Cannot Lie!

Here's the Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake that I adapted from Love & Olive Oil's blog. If you want more ideas of what to bake, check out my I Like Big Bundts page for inspiration.





I was out of milk so I used evaporated milk. Also, I used Pumpkin Pie Spice rather than cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves spices.
 

Recipe: Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake
Adapted from Love and Olive Oil (Original Recipe)

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice (Trader Joe's)
1 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 (15 oz) can pumpkin puree (not pie filling)
2 eggs, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup evaporated milk (original recipe called for 1/2 cup whole milk but I didn't have any in the house at the time)
1 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips

Ganache Topping:
6 ounces (3/4 cup) heavy cream
6 ounces chocolate chips

Directions for Bundt Cake:
1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Prepare a 12-cup Bundt pan with baking spray or butter and flour.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices.
3. In a stand mixer, cream sugar and butter until light and fluffy, about 2-4 minutes.
4. Add eggs, one at a time. Beat well.
5. Add pumpkin and vanilla. Beat well. It may look curdled, don't worry.
6. With the mixer on low, add flour mixture in three additions, alternating with two additions of milk.
7. Fold in chocolate chips.
8. Spoon batter into Bundt pan and smooth out. Baked 45-55 minutes until toothpick comes out clean.
9. Cool on wire rack for 30 minutes and then invert to cool completely.
10. When completely cooled, glaze with ganache.

Directions for Ganache:
1. Heat heavy cream until it barely simmers.
2. Pour over chocolate chips. Let sit for 1-2 minutes.
3. With a whisk, slowly mix together until everything is melted and smooth.
4. Let sit until pourable or spreadable consistency (depending on how you like your glaze) and spread on the cooled Bundt.


Some of my favorite Bundt pans:

Apple Raspberry Crisp from Bon Appetit

Apple Raspberry Crisp

I made this in April. It's now November. And I'm finally posting it. Yeah, I'm a bit behind.

But now it's perfect for fall!

This is sooooo easy to make. I just love crisps warm from the oven. Sooo delicious. I brought this to a morning meeting at work.

I got a lot of liquid at the bottom of this crisp. There is 1 Tablespoon of flour in the fruit; when I make it again, I think I'll increase the flour just a bit if I'm using frozen raspberries again. Or, I will thaw the raspberries and drain the juice. A couple of reviewers on Epicurious got a lot of liquid too.

Apple Raspberry Crisp 
Adapted from Bon Appetit

Fruit Mixture:
1/2 cup (100 grams) light brown sugar
1 Tablespoon flour
2 1/2 pounds Granny Smith apples (about 5 large), peeled, quartered, cored (recipe calls for them to be thinly sliced, but I diced mine into cubes)
1 cup frozen unsweetened raspberries (unthawed) (I used Trader Joe's) (next time, I think I might thaw the raspberries and drain some of the liquid)

Topping:
1/2 cup (100 grams) light brown sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup old-fashioned oats
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) chilled unsalted butter, diced

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Fruit Mixture: Mix the 1/2 cup brown sugar and 1 Tablespoon flour in a large bowl. Add the apple slices and raspberries and toss them in the flour. Put fruit in a greased 8 x 8-inch baking dish (my dish was a bit bigger).
3. Topping: In a medium bowl, mix together the dry ingredients (oats, cinnamon, salt, brown sugar and flour). Add chilled butter and rub in with fingertips until moist clumps form. Sprinkle topping over filling.
4. Bake until apples are tender and topping is golden brown and set, 1 hour or so. Cool at least 20 minutes before eating. Eat warm or room temperature.