u/Affectionate-Lake-60

More pics from our recent party. I needed a way to use up some more egg yolks, and Cookshelf pointed me towards this recipe. Is like all of Berenbaum’s recipes: very detailed and exacting, with weights in grams and directions that take you step by detailed step from mise en place to cooking and storing the result. If you do exactly what she says, you get a great result.

To be honest, I often can’t be bothered. I’d usually rather do a good enough job and get a good enough result than a scrupulous job for an even better result. But this IS a great cookie. I love the smell of the lime and ginger while making the dough and in first opening the oven. The flavor isn’t as strong in eating the actual cookie, but they’re good. I see from my photos that I didn’t brown them as much as she does, and they’d probably be even better if I’d left them in a few minutes longer.

Note: she says the zest of two limes weighs four grams and I don’t see how that’s possible, especially if you avoid the white pith. Mine register as zero on my scale. I just went with the number of limes, and the cookies do taste satisfactorily of lime.

More cookies! I hadn’t baked from Hollis’s books before this because I think of him mostly as an entertainer (it’s my husband who buys his books, and he doesn’t bake). But I had a couple of extra egg yolks, and the Cookshelf app pointed me at this when I searched up “egg yolk cookies.” Boy howdy, these are a winner! They don’t look like much, but I used an organic European-style butter and the butter flavor is out of this world. The dough was easy to handle, too (I rolled it out between sheets of parchment paper; it’s malleable but sticky.) Highly recommended.

Another one from our recent party. I don’t particularly recommend this book; I’ve had more disappointments than successes from it. If you do choose to use it, please note that I think you should use salted butter, even though they never say so explicitly. Everything I made from it was bland until I started adding a pinch of salt.

Even so, I’ve kept it for years on the strength of this one recipe, which I love. I’ve never made it as written because I can’t eat walnuts. It uses sherry in the thick white frosting layer and stirs in chopped walnuts. I’ve used amaretto with almonds and Frangelico with hazelnuts. This latest batch is my furthest departure yet: kirsch in the frosting, nothing stirred in, and finely crushed freeze-dried cherries sprinkled on before the final chocolate drizzle. For the drizzle, I cooked the kirsch down a little to reduce the strong alcohol flavor and added some Lorann’s cherry oil (just a tiny bit; those oils are strong). Not everybody likes this cookie, but those who like it love it.

We just had a cookie-themed party, and I did a couple of family favorites from this book. It’s a facsimile edition of the book my mother-in-law used when my husband was growing up. The chocolate crinkles are a favorite of his, and one of my kids loves the lemon snowdrops.

The book is kind of old school (not surprising), with cookies that are smaller and not as rich, sweet, and elaborate as some newer cookbooks.

I have two chairs that I bought at some kind of surplus sale in the late 1980s or early 90s in Berkeley, California. A hotel or office building or some such was selling off a lot of old items, including dozens of these chairs. They’re not a fancy designer or anything, but they’re comfortable and I love them and I want to give them a glow-up. I thought I’d start by trying to learn more about them.

They’re solid wood with vinyl upholstery. Under the vinyl there is some kind of kapok-like stuffing, burlap, and metal (I assume steel) zigzag springs. There might be other layers in there, too; I haven’t taken them apart yet. I’ve included photos showing some construction details. I can’t find any labels, stamps, etc.

Measurements:
Width arm-tip to arm-tip 25”
Width of back without arms 20”
Front to back at the feet 25 1/2”
Height 29 3/4”

I’d love to know anything you can tell me. Designer or maker would be awesome, though possibly unlikely for pieces this pedestrian. I’d also love to know what type of wood and finish this might be, since that will surely play into the restoration process.