One of the highlights of my Thanksgiving trip home (beyond family/friends/food) was getting to play with my new (used) toy: Nikon D40 w/ 18-55mm VR lens. =D
I’ve used a point ‘n shoot my entire life, so I’m pretty excited to be able to play around a little bit more creatively. For example one of the benefits of having a normal sized lens is that you can actually adjust the depth of focus…
Autumn
…isolation…everyone say oooo….
I’m still learning all the controls and the limits of the camera, but hopefully you’ll notice an upgrade in the quality of the photos that I post (especially if you’ve been following this site for a while.) Either that, or I’ll have just outed myself as a photography poseur.
The other highlight of the trip home was walking into my local Whole Foods clone and coming across these…
Hermit Bars
OMG! Cookies that share my (nick)name! They’re pretty tasty. Probably far tastier than I would be. Particularly since it’d be pretty hard for me to season myself properly during the cooking process.
Anyways, Hermits are sort of like ginger-molasses cookies with raisins in very chewy bar form. (Hmmm…I wonder if that has any personal significance…what the heck would it mean to be “chewy”?) But enough pseudo-cookie-based-philosophy. The short story is, I definitely know what I’m going to be making for coffee hour next time. =b
Hermit Bars
source: Cookie Madness
adapted from Cook’s Illustrated
8 tablespoons butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup molasses
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground mace (or pinch of nutmet
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt (use less if using salted butter)
1 cup raisins (plumped)
1/2 cup chopped pecans, toasted
1 egg, beaten
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- Cream together butter and sugar using high speed of electric mixer.
- Beat for 3 minutes.
- Beat in eggs and molasses.
- In a separate bowl, stir together all dry ingredients.
- Stir dry ingredients into molasses mixture.
- Stir in raisins and nuts.
- Line two baking sheets with parchment or silpats.
- Divide dough into 2 sections and form two logs of about 14×2 inches.
- Brush logs with beaten egg.
- Bake for 15 minutes.
- Let cool for 15 minutes.
- Slice each log at an angle about 2 inches thick.
Makes about 16 bars.
