The Big Cookie Project: Week 27

I know two wrongs don't make a right, but hopefully in the baking world, two baked goods that both break my "rules" can equal one cookie for the week. My first "rule break" are these Lemon Bars. I made them for a Ladies Night, and gave some extra to Greg's work friends. He came home and said that they would like some more, so I have made two batches of these this week. Even though I said in one of my first blogs that I wasn't going to do any bar-baked goods, I decided that this might equal 1/2 of the cookie for this week. I hope that works for you :)

These Lemon Bars are courtesy of Paula Deen. If you don't know who Paula is, her motto should be, "the more butter, the better." I would have to agree with her, atleast in the baking world. I've never made Lemon Bars before, so I think my first batch was a little over-done because I didn't know they were supposed to be squishy in the center, I just thought they weren't done cooking. My second batch was much squishy-er in the middle, which is more on target of what a Lemon Bar should look like. Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

Crust:

2 cups flour

1 cup confectioner's sugar

Pinch salt

2 sticks butter

Filling:

4 eggs

2 cups granulated sugar

6 Tablespoons flour

6 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease a 9x13 pan

2. Make the crust by combining the flour and confectioner's sugar. Cut the butter in tabs and mix in with your hands to make a crumbly mixture.Press the mixture in to the bottom of the pan and bake for 20 minutes.

3. While the crust is baking, make the custard. Combine all the ingredients and whisk until all incorporated. Pour it over the baked crust and bake another 25 minutes longer. Sprinkle with confectioner's sugar if desired, when completely cooled.

My next 1/2 of the Big Cookie Project this week was to make my last Fall Cookie. I decided to use a sugar cookie recipe that I have already used (hence this cookie only counting as 1/2 because it broke the rules). The only fall object that I could think of was candy corn, so I made them in to cookie form! I divided my sugar cookie dough in to 3 equal parts. I dyed one part yellow, 1 part orange, and then 1 part I didn't do any thing to it. I rolled them out in to equal lengths. Squished them together and made them stick together with a little water. Then, I rolled them out as one big section.
I then took a big chef knife and started making triangles. The top and bottom colors reverse every cookie, but it doesn't bother me too much.Here is the end product. The yellow turned out more vibrant after baking, which I was glad about, because you could barely see the yellow when I was dying the dough. I think they turned out really cute, and now this gets me off the hook of having to decorate them with icing, which I am super bad at. They taste pretty good too, but they are not the size of real candy corns, so I am having to tell myself that the number of candies in one serving of candy corn candies is not equal to the same number of cookies. I hope their not all gone by morning!