My First Business

I started to make money of my baking skills as a shy, 15 year old school girl. Read about my first business here: http://discoveringranchlife.blogspot.com/2013/02/my-first-business.html

Grandma' Agnes Fudge Cookies

I've admired my Grandma' Agnes as long as I can remember. She was a cool Lady, something extraordinary and I'm not saying that just because she was my Grandma. She traveled around the world until she was 80 years old, because she loved it. Of course she wasn't 80 years old if you asked her…she was 19 years old all her life. I have so many great memories having fun with her. One time I had to bribe a guy that rented out surf boards so that he wouldn't rent her any, she was 78 at the time. She didn't have any limits what so ever. Another time she slapped me in the face for not introducing her as my girl friend, when we met some new people on a cruising ship. We traveled all over Southern Europe, Hawaii, Alaska and many other states together. She was the one giving me my first camera when I was 5 years old. Agnes was, believe it or not, an incredible baker. 

Today I'm sharing her Fudge Cookies. That's one of my favorite recipe's, for many reasons. They taste absolutely wonderful, but they are so sweet that your tongue kind of curls and you only want one cookie. I like that too. I rather have one awesome cookie than ten cookies that are so and so. Grandma' Agnes Fudge Cookies are also very easy to make AND it only takes 20 mins (altogether, mixing and baking in the oven.) The perfect quick fix that you can't go wrong with. My son learned to bake them by himself at age four. So far I haven't met anyone that doesn't like them. They are easy to make, like with all cookies it's very important to not over bake them. I think that's the only thing that possibly could go wrong. They are suppose to be baked for EXACTLY 12 mins.

Grandma' Agnes Fudge Cookies

4oz Butter

1/2 Cup Sugar

2tbs Maple Syrup

Cut the cold butter into pieces

Cut the butter in pieces and mix the ingredients. I mix them by hand with a fork. 

Mix 1,5 Cup All Purpose Flour and 1/2 tbs Baking Powder separately.

Mix all the ingredients together. I usually put them all on a table and mix them with my hands. That's how Grandma' did. If you want to you can add some vanilla extract. It gives them a nice touch, but it's not necessarily. Mix the dough with your hands until it's smooth and there's no big chunks of butter left.

Divide the dough into two equal pieces.

Two equal pieces of dough, rolled into strings
 and placed on parchment paper. 

Roll them to long strings and place them on parchment paper. Use your hands and put a little pressure on the strings. 

Bake them in the lower part of your oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 12 minutes.

When they are done they are still soft, but only for less than a minute. Cut them into desired pieces at once. Leave them on the baking sheet to cool down, for at least 10 minutes.

I prefer to have one cookie to my coffee, the Swedish way. What do you like to drink to your cookies? 

A Swedish Christmas Tradition; Lussekatter

Lussekatt, an important part of a traditional Swedish Christmas.
You start eating them on the day of St.Lucia, Dec13.

Dec 13 is an important day in Sweden. It´s the day of St.Lucia. Lucia means “the one who comes with the light”. She died as a martyr for her Christian faith. Her incredible faith is celebrated Dec 13. It´s an old Swedish tradition to drink glögg a warm, spicy wine and eat Lusse Katter which is a delicious pastry with saffron during Lucia. The saffron gives the pastry a yellow color, a symbol of light.

There´s many different stories about lussekatten. According to one story St. Nikolaus gave them as gifts to the children.

Several stories have to do with worshipping the sun, like the Vikings did. The pastries yellow color is here a symbol of the sun.

For most people it´s not at all about the origin. Lucia is an interesting celebration. A bright light in the winter darkness. The celebration takes place very early in the morning. According to some beliefs there are many dark forces in action on Dec 13 and you´re supposed to stay awake all night to watch out for them, in the morning you celebrate Lucia (the light).

Every year each town, school and most companies vote for their own Lucia. Most often this “competitions” turns in to beauty competitions and a blond, blue eyed girl wins. She wears a white nightgown and has burning candles in her hair leading a caravan of girls that also wear white gowns but without candles in their hair. The girls wear a red scarf around their waist as a symbol Lucia´s death as a martyr. There are boys among them too; they are dressed up like Santa´s helpers or gingerbreads! The whole caravan sings a special Lucia song and other Christmas Carroll’s.  They sing for elder people and people in need. Some go from house to house and sing for neighbors. Children often sing for parents.

 
Many organizations have their own Lucia caravan to sing for a good cause.

After the celebration everybody eats Lusse Katter Some people have parties, social gatherings in the evening were they drink glögg and eats Lusse Katter. It´s common to eat gingerbread as well.

My daughter Hayley and I baked Lussekatter yesterday on Lucia. According to the tradition you start eating them at Lucia (Dec 13) and eat them until Christmas. You can´t find them during the rest of the year. It´s a very popular pastry and many people are counting the days to Lucia so they finally can eat them.

 

 



This is what you need for 18 big Lussekatter:

A pinch of Saffron (if you like the taste of saffron use more)

6oz unsalted butter

2 cups milk or half and half

3/4 cup sugar

2+1 eggs

1½oz dry yeast (6 small pouches)

2½lbs white baking flour

Raisins

o   Mix 2lbs of the flour with the yeast and the sugar in a big bowl.

o   Melt the butter on the stove, add the milk. Heat the liquid until right before the first bubble (very hot!). Add saffron. Stir. Add two eggs.

o   Pour the liquid over the dry ingredients and mix the dough thoroughly until it´s very smooth and easy to work with. Add some more flour if needed.

o   Let the dough rest under a cover for 15 minutes.

o   Cut the dough in 18 pieces.

 

 

 

o   Form the pieces like in the pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

o   Put the pieces on baking sheets. Add two raisins in the middle of the buns. (Some people add extra raisins in the dough for a sweeter bun.)

 

 

o   Let them rest for 20 mins.

o   Paint them with the extra egg.

o   Bake them in the middle of the oven at 480 degrees Fahrenheit for 8 minutes, or until they have a beautiful golden color.

 

 

 

 

 

If you want to be really Swedish you enjoy them with warm wine, glögg, but they taste great with coffee or tea as well.

Maybe you want to add Lussekatter to your family´s Christmas traditions?

Tell me about the one pastry you can´t be without during this Holiday season! Feel free to share the recipe if you want too.

XO Maria