Wild Foraged Holiday Cookies
Happy December everyone, holiday season is upon us! One of my favorite holiday traditions is baking cookies to share with my loved ones. I also love to cook with wild ingredients, so why not do BOTH! Here's some amazing cookie recipes from Backyard Forager, each with a different wild ingredient.
Spruce Tip Shortbread Cookies
1/2 cup spruce tips (if spruce doesn't grow near you, another evergreen like pine, fir, or hemlock can be used as a substitute)
1/4 cup sugar (1/3 cup if you like sweeter shortbread)
1 cup flour
a pinch of salt
1/2 cup or 1 stick of softened butter
1. Finely chop your spruce tips in a food processor. Add in your sugar and pulse to combine. Then add the flour, salt, and butter, and pulse until the dough is crumbly. Remove it, roll it into a ball, cover with a beeswax wrap or seal in a container and refrigerate at least half an hour.
2. Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.
3. Flour a cutting board or counter top and roll out your dough until it's 1/4-1/8th an inch thick. Cut the dough into whatever shapes you like.
4. Place your cookies about an inch apart from each other on a baking sheet. Baking on parchment paper is good for shortbread cookies since they're so buttery and keeps them from getting too brown, but it's not necessary.
5. Bake 20 minutes, add a few minutes more if they're not golden enough, and let them cool. The lemony spruce flavor comes out best in a fully cooled cookie.
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Juniper Berry Icing for Gingerbread/Ginger Snaps
Lots of us love gingerbread cookies for the holidays. This juniper berry icing is strong, sweet, warm, slightly bitter, and will complement your favorite gingerbread recipe perfectly *chefs kiss*
1/3 cup juniper berries
3/4 cup half & half
1 lb. or 3 & 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
1. Lightly crush the juniper berries using a mortar and pestle or spice grinder. You don't want a powder, just to break them up a bit.
2. Combine your berries and half & half in a saucepan and heat to a simmer, whisking to keep it from scorching. Remove from heat at the first sign of bubbles and let it cool for 4-5 hours, giving the berries time to steep.
3. Strain the half & half and discard the berries.
4. Add your confectioners' sugar to a bowl and add your half & half bit by bit until you have the desired icing consistency. You may not need all of the half & half. Transfer it to a squeeze bottle to ice your cookies or frost them with a spatula. The icing will stay good for several weeks in the fridge.
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Persimmon Black Walnut Cookies
If American persimmons don't grow near you, Asian persimmons work too and are commonly found at supermarkets. If you don't like black walnuts, pecans or regular walnuts are a great substitute in these cakey cookies.
1 cup persimmon pulp
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. ground spicebush berries (or ground allspice)
1 stick or 1/2 cup of softened butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 egg
1 & 3/4 cups flour
1/2 cup chopped black walnuts
1/2 cup raisins
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and line cookie sheets with parchment paper.
2. Slice the tops off your persimmons and use a spoon to scoop the flesh out. Press the fruit through a strainer, food mill, or potato ricer to separate the seeds from the flesh. Set aside your fruit pulp
3. Combine your persimmon pulp, ground spicebush berries, and baking soda in a bowl and set aside.
3. Cream the butter and sugars and add your vanilla and egg. Mix well. Add in your persimmon pulp and combine. Add flour and mix until it's just integrated. Add and stir in your nuts and raisins gently.
4. Spoon our generous tablespoons of batter onto the parchment paper with about 2 inches between each cookie. Bake for 12-18 minutes until they're golden brown. Let them cool on the baking sheets before moving, they're soft and fragile when warm. You should end up with ~3 dozen cookies.
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