A SoHo Jaunt

Yesterday I met my friend Carol in SoHo for lunch at Kelley and Ping, an overpriced and under inspired Asian noodle place on Greene Street in SoHo. The best thing about Kelley and Ping is that it's right around the corner from the Apple store where I had popped in to pick up a few gifts.

As Carol and I walked back toward her office, we passed Vesuvio Bakery, a SoHo landmark and a must visit if you're ever in that part of town. Vesuvio is a throw back to a simpler time when life was easier and mass market baked goods didn't exist. The space itself is tiny, but the selection of breads, sandwiches, wraps, salads, and home-baked goods is large and absolutely wonderful. The place is so tiny that there are no tables or chairs. You have to go elsewhere to eat.

I stopped dead in my tracks as we passed Vesuvio because of the wonderful display of cookies in both front windows. The cookies were mesmerizing. Stacks of cookies as big as you hand were beckoning. Among the cookie stacks were some random glass balls that looked like Christmas decorations strewn about. In the one window was a miniature version of the Statue of Liberty. I could hear her saying, "Give me your tired, your poor, huddled masses, yearning to eat cookies."

I whipped out my IPhone and started to snap away while unbeknownst to me, Carol was inside buying one of the luscious looking chocolate chip cookies. We devoured it right there on the street in front of the bakery. Before we dug in, we admired the deep golden color, the massive chunks of deep, rich, chocolate and the sheer size of the damn thing. It was one of the largest cookies I have ever seen. The cookie was pretty good, but I felt it was lacking salt. Frankly, it was a tad bland for my liking. Carol commented that it wasn't as sweet as some chocolate chip cookies she's eaten. In her book that was a plus. In my book, that's a negative. The sweeter the better.

We walked back west toward Hudson Street and said our goodbyes on the corner before I headed home to put on my workout clothes and burn off some of the calories from the cookie I just shared.

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Cookies Piled High

















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Cookie With Carol's Big Bite

Hungarian Shortbread

Buttery, melt-in-your-mouth shortbread cookies are another one of my favorites. I tend to have a lot of favorite cookies if you haven't noticed but there's something about the simplicity of shortbread that I especially like. Other types of cookies rely on "stuff" to make them good such as chips, extracts, nuts, or glazes. Shortbread can stand on its own.

I've been making this Hungarian Shortbread recipe for a few years now and it's fairly simple, and makes a delicious cookie with or without the raspberry jam filling. A couple of weeks ago I made a batch of homemade raspberry jam from local raspberries I picked myself (well, with Mike's help) near our upstate home. While I was picking, I came upon a praying mantis among the raspberry bushes and snapped a picture of him with my IPhone. Just as I was about to take the photo, it turned its head and looked directly at me as if to say, "May I help you?"














The recipe requires freezing the dough for at least 30 minutes to 3 hours and then grating the frozen dough on a box grater. This helps the shortbread to have a light, crumbly texture. I bet it would be fun for kids to make (with proper supervision of course).

My oven is on the fritz so the top didn't brown as much as I would have liked. I've called Bill the repairman and he's scheduled for next week.

This recipe is based on one in Baking with Julia by Dorie Greenspan.

Special equipment needed: box grater and 10" springform pan
Any grater with large holes will do if you don't have a box grater. You may also use a 9" x 9" square baking pan, lined with foil and lightly greased with butter.


Hungarian Shortbread

2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 egg yolks
3/4 cup raspberry jam

Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
Cream butter in a large bowl with a mixer on high speed until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Turn mixer to medium and add sugar and egg yolks; mix until sugar is dissolved and mixture is light, about 4 minutes. With mixer on low speed, slowly add flour mixture and mix until dough just begins to come together, about 1 minute.

Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface and bring it together with your hands into one lump. Divide the dough in half and form two balls. Wrap each in plastic and freeze at least 30 minutes or up to 3 hours.

Arrange an oven rack in the center of oven. Heat to 350 degrees. Grease a 10" springform pan with butter. Remove a ball of dough from the freezer, unwrap, and grate, using the large holes of a box grater, directly into prepared pan. Gently pat the grated dough to even it out. Spread jam evenly over the dough, leaving about a 1/2" border around the edge. Grate remaining dough on top of jam and pat gently until the surface is even. Bake until light golden brown, about 25-30 minutes. Let cool completely in pan, on a rack, before cutting into wedges and serving.

Cookie press rating: 3.75 cookies (out of 5)

Grated Dough (looks like cheese!)













Spreading the Jam

Raspberry-Cream Sandwich Cookies

The name says it all. What could be better than raspberries and cream in the form of a sandwich cookie? Nothing comes to mind. Sandwich cookies are great because you get two cookies wrapped around a creamy center. There is a reduced guilt factor since technically you're eating only one cookie. Am I right?

The filling is made with white chocolate, heavy cream, and fresh raspberries. Believe me, these cookies are so rich you won't want to eat more than one at a time. They're great for sharing since their shelf is two or three days at most. After three days they turned to a sweet ball of mush.

The recipe calls for fresh raspberries, but I'm sure you could use frozen strawberries thawed and drained of excess liquid. I used a tablespoon of dough for each cookie but I suggest you make them smaller since they spread quite a lot which led to rather large cookies.

Here's the recipe on Martha Stewart's website.

Cookie press rating: 3 cookies (out of five)