Last night some friends came over to the house to grill an ambitious collection of meats purchased on an outing to Nashville’s new but already acclaimed Porter Road Butcher. Since the “menfolk” were rather preoccupied with the prodigiously sized pork chops and angsting over the charcoal situation to make sure their selection of gourmet sausages were crisped to perfection, it seemed clear pretty quickly that the dessert portion of this meal was going to be entirely overlooked if I didn’t do something about it. Reb suggested, in the way that men have which they seem to think — for reasons that neither I nor any other girl can discern — is very sly, that I whip up some kind of portable, un-fussy dessert. I returned his conspiratorial gaze and praised him for his foresight. “I’ve got it under control,” I whispered, and immediately began assembling ingredients for the ultimate portable dessert: the cookie. I mixed up some chocolate chip walnut cookies but thought the occasion — a festive but casual gathering on a fine autumn evening — really called for two varieties, so I squinted into the pantry and culled a few baggies and jars as my mind began to formulate a mix of chewy, spicy, nutty and sweet. Thus, the cranberry walnut spice cookie was born. The resulting cookies are crisp around the edges but — when removed from the oven while still soft and allowed to kind of “deflate” on the pan for a few minutes — delightfully chewy inside. The ginger gives them a hint of the flavor that I, for one, associate with molasses cookies; which, for as long as I can remember, have been a cherished family tradition associated with this season. These cookies, studded with golden raisins, tart dried cranberries and walnuts — which you could toast in the oven at 350° on an ungreased baking sheet for 10 minutes if you wanted to afford your cookies even more depth of flavor — are easy to mix up and have a surprisingly spicy taste. Besides, the smell as they bake will fill your kitchen and home with a wonderful buttery, brown-sugary aroma that will be sure to get you in the Thanksgiving spirit!
Cranberry Walnut Spice Cookies
Ingredients
2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup softened butter
2 eggs
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup light brown sugar
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1 Tbsp vanilla extract
1 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup dried cranberries, chopped
1/2 cup golden raisins
Preheat oven to 375°. In a large bowl, combine all dry ingredients with the spices and whisk them together. In the bowl of an electric mixer or another large bowl, cream the butter and the sugars. Add the eggs, and vanilla and stir until the mixture is incorporated. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture, stirring after each addition and scraping down the bowl to ensure that everything is mixed in. Finally, stir in the walnuts, the cranberries and the raisins. Drop by rounded tablespoonfulls or using a medium-sized ice cream scoop onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bake for 9-11 minutes or until the edges are brown and the interior of the cookie is soft. Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 2 to 3 minutes before removing them to a cooling rack.
