Beebox

Hier geht's zur deutschen Version dieses Posts When I - driven from a real "Breaking Bad Bread" experience - challenged my baking buddies from The Fresh Loaf , Facebook and several congenial blogs to create a " Bread for the Knight with the Iron Hand ", I promised myself to try all 30 loaves over time. One of those congenial blogs is Britta's Brot vom Niederrhein - Bread from the Lower Rhine. Britta, 35-year old process engineer and mother of two, named her blog after the lower Rhine region of North Rhine-Westphalia/Germany, where she lives and works. Britta: "Others knit to relax, I bake!" "It is pretty here, prettier than many believe. Industrial culture has its charm, the view from a heap to the blast furnaces, chimneys, and the Rhine with its many green meadows and sheep is really pretty." The Lower Rhine with its industrial culture has its own charm - coal mine Zollern in Dortmund Idyllic contrast to heaps and chimneys: sheep grazi...

After missing the ABC-Bakers' May challenge - I made the Brown Butter Banana Bread , but went on my trip to Germany before I could post it - the June project, Tender Loving Crackle Cookies came just right to cure my baking withdrawal symptoms. Three weeks without touching a mixer or kneading a dough! I rarely bake cookies other than around Christmas - except, the famous NY Times Best Chocolate Chip Cookies''. The crackled cookies looked really attractive, so I decided to give them a try. Maine's own Allen's Coffee Brandy To enhance the chocolate flavor, I added 1/2 teaspoon espresso powder , and, being a Mainer, for good measure, threw in another 1/2 teaspoon of Allen's Coffee Flavored Brandy . Otherwise I didn't change the recipe. Christina's cookies are perfectly risen small mounds - mine, alas, turned from nice little balls into this: Flounders! They spread like flounders, especially the ones I shaped last!   Who was to blame? I found the answer on...