If you have a hint or trick you'd like to share with other bakers, send me e-mail and I'll include it!

General

Relax. These are Christmas cookies and breads; the baking should be as much fun as the eating. If the final product tastes good, don't agonize over how it looks.

Crack each egg into a cup or small bowl before adding to the other ingredients, just in case one has gone bad. Only once in 15 years of baking have I found a bad egg, but I was very glad I didn't need to throw out everything already in the mixing bowl and start over again.

Ingredients that are added together can go into the same bowl. This has two advantages: there's no mistaking the bag of sugar for a bag of flour if you've put it on the counter, and when you need to move quickly, you won't delay in measuring out or, worse, washing the measuring spoons. Many cooks recommend lining up the ingredients in the order that the recipe calls for them.

The apron is my friend.

Dark baking sheets and pans are bad. Dark colors absorb heat, leading to easier burning. I prefer a nice, shiny aluminum. Air-cushion sheets (two sheets of metal with a thin, insulating layer of air between) are another story. Bottoms of cookies won't burn, but they also won't brownas quickly as "regular" cookie sheets. Most bakers love or hate them, it seems.

If you forget an ingredient, don't panic. How important is this ingredient? If you've forgotten the baking powder or yeast, start over. If a flavoring is missing, like one spice of many or an extract, try the recipe without it. If you've forgotten a "filling", like nuts or raisins or chocolate chips, mix them in slowly. If you've forgotten the eggs, don't add as much flour and try a sheet anyhow; don't add eggs at the end of the recipe because it won't work (my aunt tried).

If there was any doubt, Henry Rollins is not holiday music.

Measuring

For baking, measuring does not need to be overly accurate, but you still want to be as accurate as possible.

Dry ingredients like flour, cocoa and baking powder are usually measured with the dip and sweep method. The measuring cup or spoon is dipped into the flour or what have you, then leveled with a knife.

Brown sugar is packed into the measuring cup or spoon, then leveled with a knife.

To measure sticky ingredients like peanut butter or honey, first measure any fat (especially oil) with the same cup or spoon. Then the honey and peanut butter will not stick.

Soft, chunky ingredients like raisins should be pressed into the measuring cup. Dry chunky ingredients should be measured into the cup, then the cup tapped against the table to settle the ingredients, and more added if necessary.

Eggs are assumed to be large.

Separating eggs

1. To separate eggs, gently crack the egg around its middle against the edge of a tea cup or with the dull edge of a knife blade.
2. Gently pry the two halves of the shell apart over a tea cup, keeping one eggshell half on the bottom.
3. When the two eggshells are separated, slowly pour the yolk from the one half shell to the other, then back again, letting as much of the white run off as possible.
4. If you drop the yolk into the white, and the yolk has not broken, use your fingers to fish the yolk out of the white.
5. If you break the yolk and some gets into the white, pour the yolk into the white and pour the egg into an airtight container and store' in the refrigerator for up to a day.
6. After the eggs have separated, pour the white into one bowl, the yolk into another. Yolks and whites will keep for a day in the refrigerator.

Whipping egg whites

1. Start whipping the whites on low speed.
2. When the whites are bubbly -- about half a minute -- increase the mixer speed to medium.
3. When the whites are foamy, increase the mixer speed to high.

Folding whipped egg whites

1. Drop whites to batter (cake) or filling to whites (mereingue cookies).
2. Use a spatula, and work slowly.
3. Keeping the flat of the spatula parallel to the sides of the bowl, bring the spatula down into the batter or whites.
4. Turning the spatula so that it remains parallel to the sides and bottom of the bowl, bring the spatula along the bottom of the bowl and up the other side.
5. Flip the spatula over the batter or whites. This will draw the batter and whites up and over.
6. Give the bowl a small turn, and continue folding.

Cookies

Mixing techniques

Butter cookies, including rolled, drop and refrigerator cookies:

1. If you can, use a stand mixer. Electric hand mixers usually don't have the power for cookie dough.
2. Cream the butter by beating in the mixer on high speed until the butter is lighter in color and fluffy.
3. Scrape down, add the sugar and continue to cream butter and sugar on high speed.
4. Scrape down again, add eggs and liquid ingredients, such as extracts and flavorings.
5. Sift together all dry ingredients into a second bowl.
6. Scrape butter-egg mixture down, add the sifted dry ingredients, and mix on medium speed until the mixture resembles dough. If you have a large batch, add the flour in two or three additions.
7. Scrape the bottom of the bowl up to incorporate any leftover flour, and mix on medium speed for another 10 or 15 seconds.
8. Mix in any fillings such as chocolate chips or raisins on low speed until evenly distributed.
9. Chill dough for any cookies that need to be shaped, like cut-outs and spritz. All butter cookie dough can be chilled in an airtight container, or wrapped in plastic and foil and frozen.

Meringues, like forgotten cookies and Haselnussbroetchen:

1. Carefully separate the yolks and whites, saving yolks for a cookie like S's or Austecherle.
2. Whip whites until soft peaks form.
3. When soft peaks have formed, gradually add sugar in a thin stream while continuing to mix on high.
4. The whites are finished when glossy and stiff, also when a spoon can stand in the mixture.
5. Gently fold in other ingredients.
6. Even if you don't normally, bake on sheets lined with baking or parchment paper.

Rolling & cutting techniques

Cookie dough is a little sticky, which causes the most problems with rolling out the dough. Springerle dough is especially sticky. To overcome the stickiness,

• Chill the dough, 20 minutes to an hour, depending on the amount of dough. Keep the dough not being rolled out in the refrigerator.
• A marble or other stone pastry board will keep the dough being rolled cool, especially if you chill the board.
• Dust the rolling area and rolling pin with a small amount of flour. I like to use a metal powdered sugar shaker for even distribution.
• Particularly sticky doughs can be rolled between sheets of wax or parchment paper.

If the dough is too stiff from being too cold, work it with your hands to flatten it. Don't overwork it, because the dough will become stiff or become too warm.

How to roll:

1. To start rolling the dough, take two handfulls of dough (about one cup) and squish it into a ball, then flatten into a thick disk, about two inches thick.
2. Dust the rolling area and both sides ofthe dough disk with flour, and place the dough disk on the floured work surface. Hold the rolling pin over the dough disk and dust it with flour. Rub the excess flour from the rolling pin, and brush off the top of the dough.
3. Roll the pin along the dough. Don't press down into the dough; let the weight of the pin flatten the dough. If you press too hard, you'll press the dough into the work surface, and the dough will stick.
4. After a few strokes with the rolling pin, give the dough a quarter turn.
   
   If the dough sticks, dust the top with flour and flip it over. Use a dough scraper, metal spatula or sharp chef's knife to unstick the dough.
5. Continue rolling and turning until the dough is the correct thickness.

I make a lot of cookies, and cutting out a cookie, then placing it on the sheet wastes a lot of time. It's much faster to cut out multiple cookies and hold them in your hand.

When making cut outs, like sugar cookies or Ausstecherle, cut out cookies from the first piece of dough, and return the scraps to the refrigerator while rolling a fresh piece of dough. Roll all the dough out once, keeping the scraps in the fridge. Then re-roll and cut out the scraps. This way, the scraps have a chance to chill again.

Chrusciki: Really a two-person job. One person forms the cookies while the other watches the hot oil.

Pinwheels: Like other cookies with little flour, be sure the dough is very cold when shaping the cookies.

Use a very sharp knife to cut the rolled dough to avoid flattening the spirals. Also turn the log a quarter turn after each cut.

Rum balls: To coat the balls with sugar, drop two or three balls into a small bowl that has about a quarter cup of powdered sugar. Jiggle the bowl to move the cookies and coat them.

Springerle: When the cookies are left out overnight, they should be covered to prevent dust from settling (ew!). However, be sure to use a tea towel, because the towel will "breathe," and allow the cookies to dry out. Wax paper, platic wrap and aluminum foil will turn the cookies into little pillows.

Your mixer must be up to the job of these cookies; you can burn out your mixer motor making these.

Cakes

Mixing techniques

Traditionally, cakes use both chemical and physical leavening. Chemical leavening is usually baking powder or soda. The physical leavening is often stiffly beaten egg whites; the air incorporated into the whites will expand when hot, giving the cake structure.

Adding egg whites to batter:

1. Following the directions in the cake recipe, combine the other ingredients to form a batter.
2. Whip egg whites until stiff but not dry. The easiest way to learn the difference between stiff and dry is to beat the whites until they are dry and then try to fold them into batter; it will be difficult, but do that once, and you'll know the difference well.
3. Scoop about a third of the beaten whites and fold into the batter with a spatula. This will lighten the batter enough that the remaining whites lose less air.
4. Once the first third of the egg whites have been folded into the batter, fold in the remaining whites using the same technique.

Breads

Some words on yeast

Yeast is a living organism. Yeast eats starches, fats and sugars, and releases carbon dioxide as a by-product of its meals. The released carbon dioxide is trapped by the protein structure of the kneaded dough, causing the dough to rise.

In the very beginning was airborne yeast and sourdough breads. Later, ways were discovered to breed yeast and store yeast, and the world was given cake yeast. Later, a way to dry the yeast was discovered, without killing too many of the yeast cells; this is dry yeast, and stores better. Recently, manufacturers discovered ways to dry yeast without killing any yeast cells, giving us instant yeast.

One of the purposes of proofing yeast was to slough off the dead yeast cells from dried yeast. Instant yeast, not having any dead cells, does not need to be proofed, but I still proof to be sure the yeast has not gone beyond its expiration date.

Cook's Illustrated recommends no more than ¹/₂ teaspon yeast per cup of flour in a sweet bread, like Stollen or Hefekranz. Most recipes call for much more than that. I've followed the Cook's Illustrated guidelines, but rounded up for even package measurements. However, I've also included teaspoon measurements for anyone who buys yeast in jars.

Store yeast in the refrigerator for long life.

Yeast is very temperature sensitive. Any temperature above lukewarm will kill it. Temperatures below a warm room will significantly slow growth, but that merely means more time for the dough to rise. Better too cold than too warm. Slow rising, in fact, is supposed to lead to better flavor development.

Mixing & kneading techniques

Proofing the yeast: Some bread recipes call for proofing the yeast, a handy technique to see if your yeast has died. To some or all of the liquid called for in the recipe, add some or all of the sweetener, and a bit of the flour. Allow to stand in a warm draft-free area for 10 to 15 minutes. The mixture should bubble and smell yeasty. Often it will look like the picture at left.

Mixing: When mixing by hand, start with a large bowl. This will keep the flour from flying all over the place. An eight quart bowl such as is seen on cooking programs and in professional kitchens works nicely. When mixing by hand, reserve a cup of flour for kneading; if the recipe calls for six to seven cups of flour, use five. Stir the ingredients just until the dough forms into a ball. The dough will look like the picture to the right.

Kneading: If you've mixed by hand, keep at least one cup of flour for kneading. Working the last cup of flour in is much easier with the hands than a spoon. Dust the work surface with a half cup of flour. Plop the dough onto the surface, and dust with another quarter cup of flour. Keep more flour on hand for dusting while kneading.

If you've never kneaded, the best description I can give is push and fold. For more advanced bakers, there is the push and fold and quarter turn. Use the heels of the hands to push the dough along the work surface; fold in half; turn so the sides are at the top and bottom and pull back towards yourself for the next push. After the first few kneads, the dough will really look like dough. Keep kneading until the dough acheives the texture described in the recipe. At the very least, the dough will spring back when you poke it, prod it or slap it. (One baking cookbook does recommend extreme violence with bread dough; good for the dough, good for the soul.)

There is no reason to mix and knead by hand if you have a mixer with a dough hook, unless you want to, of course. When I do knead by hand, I turn the dough out onto a heavily floured surface when the dough has just passed from the batter to the dough stage -- when a cup or cup and a half of flour remains to be added. The mixer's directions or recipe book should say how long the mixer will take to knead dough; my Kitchen Aid says to let the mixer run for two minutes after the dough has begun to clear the sides of the bowl.

Rising: Plop the dough into a bowl greased with oil or butter and turn it over. This keeps the dough from drying out. Cover with a clean tea towel, set the bowl someplace warm and not drafty. The usual recommendation is in a gas oven that has been turned off (the pilot light will keep the oven warm enough). I like my dining room. It's one of the smallest rooms in the house but has three heating vents. Let the dough rise until it has doubled in size. If the room isn't too cold, an average sized dough will need about an hour to do this. Another trick to see if the dough has risen enough is to stick a finger in the dough. If the indentation remains, as in the picture at right, the dough has doubled. Don't stick fingers in the dough after it's been shaped.

Shaping: To make a braid: Divide into thirds. Roll each piece into a rope two or three inches thick. Lay the ropes side by side; beginning from the middle, braid first to one end of the ropes, then to the other. When the second half of the loaf is braided, you will have to braid backwards.

The shape of stollen is said to represent the swaddling clothes of the Christ child. Shape the dough into an oval. Fold the oval in half so that that fold runs the long way. The edges should not quite overlap, so that a bit of the bottom half peeks out.

It's done when ... Knowing when yeast bread has baked through can be tricky. The traditional indicators are the the bread is evenly browned on top, and sounds hollow when tapped. Bread that is almost but not quite baked through will also sound hollow when tapped. The best indicator is an instant-read thermometer. Bread that is finished baking will be 190 degrees F (88 degrees C).

Should you run out of time and not be able to bake your bread, allow the dough to go through the first rising, shape, and place into the refridgerator. The cold will slow the yeast growth enough to give you 24 hours of breathing room. Allow the dough to come to room temperature (about one to two hours) before baking.

Increase sugar by small amounts for lighter loaves.