Sunday Salon – Lots of cookies, not many books

Oof, it has been a slow, slow reading week. I finished The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman last Sunday, and then nothing at all until yesterday, when I finished both my audiobook (The Ghost in Love by Jonathan Carroll) and The Tea Rose by Jennifer Donnelly. Reviews will go up eventually, but probably not right away – the craziness that was last week is not scheduled to stop until late Tuesday afternoon. Likewise, I started All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy as my new audiobook today, but I can’t quite pick what I’m in the mood to read next… not that it really matters, since I doubt I’m going to get any time to sit down and read until *maybe* tomorrow night. End of the semester’s killing me, here.

But I have made a lot (LOT) of cookies. It’s been a cookie-making madhouse around these parts. Sugar cookies, gingerbread cookies, cornflake wreaths, baklava, cranberry walnut white chocolate oatmeal cookies, and brigadeiro.

Brigadeiro’s a Brazilian recipe (at least, my mom learned how to make it from a Brazilian graduate student friend back in the day), although last year a Portuguese acquaintance pronounced my version “pretty good” after correcting my spelling and pronunciation. As I understand it, in its native range it’s not specifically a Christmas treat, but it’s become family tradition to have it with the Christmas cookies, and it very rarely gets made any other time. It’s easy, can be made to look pretty, and is so very chocolatey.

Brigadeiro

– 1 T butter
– 1 can sweetened condensed milk (better not to use the fat-free stuff – it still works, but it takes longer and the texture’s kind of wonky)
– 1 square unsweetened baker’s chocolate (or 2 1/2 T unsweetened cocoa)
– Chocolate sprinkles

In a non-stick saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Dump in the sweetened condensed milk and the baker’s chocolate, and stir until the chocolate’s melted and combined.

Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, until the mixture thickens and begins to “come away from the edge of the pan.” This point is kind of tricky to know when you’ve reached it, but if you get to the next step and find that the mix isn’t thick enough once it’s cooled, it can always be re-heated.

Let the mix cool until it’s comfortable to handle but still warm. With buttered hands, roll the mix into ~1 in. balls, then roll them in a dish of chocolate sprinkles to coat. Serve in petit-four paper cups. Tastes like chocolate and Christmas.

I’ve seen variations where you’re rolling them in cocoa powder, or colored sprinkles, or nuts, or shredded coconut, or shaved white chocolate, but the original will always be my favorite.