Anyone have any good cookie recipes? A bunch of us at school are doing a cookie exchange, and I don't bake too often, and I don't have any good recipes. I looked through my cookbooks, and pretty much just found chocolate chip and oatmeal raisin and sugar cookies, which are boring. I found one interesting-looking one in an Indian cookbook, made with cardamom and ginger, but I'm not sure about it. Anyone have anything they'd recommend? The search engine at epicurious is down.

I can give you some from the cookbook.

ETA: in my lj cuz it's easier - [link]

Preheat oven to 350F

3 ounces unsweet chocho, chopped
2 cups semisweet (usually a bag, I have good luck with even the double chocolate ghiri... chips)
1 stick, (0.5 c) unsalted butter, chunked

In a double boiler, melt above, stir until smooth, and go on to next

3 large eggs, room temp
1 c + 2 tablespoons sugar
3 teaspoons fine ground espresso (french roast,etc)

Beat sugar,eggs and coffee on high until they ribbon. 3-5 minutes.

3/4 c flour
1/3 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Sift the flour, bp and salt together.

Mix chocolate with eggy stuff, thoroughly.

Add floury stuff until just mixed.

Drop spoonfuls of batter (I go small) onto greased sheet, bake 8-10 minutes. (With the small ones, 8 minutes is enough) or until they puff and crack.

If multiple staged sheets, stirring the batter thoroughly between spoonings keeps it from looking grainy.

Cool for a few minutes before taking off cooking sheets.

Well, damn. Apparently 2006 is trying to go out with a bang or some shit. Just got an email that a guy we knew in college is dead. Dead! He was younger than us! No idea how he died, but he left behind a wife. WIFE! At like, 28, a widow!?!? Damn.

He was the first boy (or, person, actually!) I ever kissed.

I suddenly realize I need to go to class, and then I realized I haven't been in like, months, and I really have to go but I'm really scared to, etc...

I haven't had one in a while, but I used to always have dreams that I was in the halls in high school, but didn't know my schedule, and couldn't find what class I was supposed to be in next.

My big, big anxiety dreams are always about plays -- every time I finish a production, about 6 weeks later I'll have a dream that the play wasn't actually over, it was just on hiatus, and the first performance of the second run is in a few minutes.

Oddly, though I haven't been in a play in FOREVER, I've had these more recently--that I'm about to be in a play, or am on stage, and don't know any of the words.

meara, that sucks about your friend. How awful.

I'm rewatching Top Chef and really even more amazed that even when they are in the same room the resemblence between Ted and Ilan still holds up. I mean, you'd think that when you saw them together you'd realize that they don't resemble each other at all. But nope, they totally do.

That recipe looks pretty good. Thanks!

ION, my microwave is now officially dead.

Also, got my hair cut, with a stylist I hadn't seen before. I like the cut, mostly, but it's got that weird uneven look that it always gets when someone who doesn't understand curly hair cuts it.

Tomorrow, I've got to go buy some barrettes and headbands, since it's not long enough to put in a ponytail anymore, and I need some way to keep it out of my face while I'm studying.

Oh my, meara. That's awful. I'm sorry.

{{{meara}}} I'm sorry.

{{meara}}

sendong out the job ma~~~ and things are looking hopeful in Matt's direction.

Today I just finished makeing eggnog icecream ( Matt doesn't want to wait to eat it until it is set) and I am finishing my mom's present

Oh meara, I'm so sorry.

Much primo jobma to MM and Suzi. Contract-ma to CaBil. And work-ma that's prosperous to Beej, and a damn good job without killing hours and demanding assbosses for Matt.

Beej, if you're going with an uncooked eggnog recipe, use Egg Beaters or a similar egg substitute. I've made homemade eggnog on Christmas morning for decades. Until one year everybody, including the cat, who always had a small amount of Christmas eggnog in her saucer, got sick with salmonella. The commercial egg substitutes are pasteurized, which eliminates the salmonella risk of using whole "fresh" eggs, which may have sat around in too-warm storage areas for too long before being shelved.

My receipe:

Two quarts whole milk, 2 tsp vanilla extract, 1 tsp rum extract, 1/2 cup sugar (more or less to taste), half to two-thirds of a pint of egg beaters. Dump one quart of the milk and all the other ingredients into the blender and hit "high". Pour half into your serving bowl or pitcher, add the rest of the milk to the blender and blend again. Add to your serving container, and serve. Set the brandy and rum bottles on the sideboard so folks can spike their own. I put ground nutmeg in a pretty silver-topped pressed glass shaker alongside the booze, but to me, nutmeg is more important on Christmas morning than the spikeage.

Edited to put in the freakin' "eggs".