Palets des Dames

Per Nana~

As we start our journey of baking from Dorie Greenspan's newest book, 

BAKING CHEZ MOI, our first recipe is a delightful cookie with an almost

 cake like texture.  Called Palets des Dames, it is a simple recipe consisting

 of butter, sugar, eggs and flour with a flavoring of vanilla added. Once they

 are baked and have cooled they are then dipped into an icing made with

 confectioner's sugar and whole milk. At this point Dorie suggests adding a

 drop of lemon flavoring but in my case I added almond extract.

 I am not a fan of lemon flavors. 

However you could add many things to the icing as well as decorate the 

cookie if you wanted to be creative.  This recipe would be a lovely 

addition to a Holiday cookie collection since it is an easy recipe that

 can be frozen and then iced later. 

Per Tricia~

We had a tradition when my kids were in elementary school that involved

 taking a 1st day of school photo with all the kids at the bus stop.

 Yes, we took the standard shots with the kids but also made a point of 

getting the annual shot of the group's new shoes.  Yup. 

It was dubbed "new clean sneaker day" by my friends and I.  

The parents had all agreed that this was the only day that all the kids

 would have new sneakers at the same time. (or clean sneakers :) 

Weird, yes. Real and special ? Check and check.  

Why mention this now ?  

I kept thinking about those first day shots as I gazed at my clean and brand 

new copy of BAKING CHEZ MOI, and then looked at my much loved and

 oft used copy of AROUND MY FRENCH TABLE. Four years into that

 adventure, the book is looking a bit rough around the edges. My BCM 

copy will likely show war wounds soon enough and I look forward

 to each splatter and stain. And yes, I took a pic of the new book :)

Now for this week's cookie recipe. 

I have wanted to make these since viewing the results from those bloggers 

who celebrated Dorie's recent birthday by testing these cookies. 

A fan of lemon flavoring (which you can see I did not inherit) in just

 about anything, I was certain I would love these cookies. And I was right. 

 The only tweak I made to the recipe is that I had to make twice the

 amount of icing called for, but was happy to do so. I think that my icing may 

have been a bit heavy handed, but no one was complaining. I added some

 decorations to celebrate the season. Both taste testers loved the results 

and I plan to make another batch with almond flavoring in the very near future. 

We are off to an excellent start on the "cook the book" adventure for 

BAKING CHEZ MOI and I am looking forward to each new recipe.