Cranberry and White Chocolate Cookies

I am massively late with this post, and a thousand apologies for that. Life has been hectic these past few weeks, but in a generally good way - work is taking off, the kids are on school holidays, we've had a couple of weddings to attend and Roast, Simmer & Bake has an exciting new project on the horizon... stay tuned for more news on that very, very soon!

No matter how mad one's schedule gets though, it is always nice to pause for minute, to take a breath,  enjoy the sunshine on your face, look out at the garden, have a cup of hot tea or coffee... and if you do, then you need these cookies to go with.

Florentines

Florentines were one of the first biscuits I ever made, very early on in my baking career. The recipe was from one of the first volumes in my cookbook collection, Essential Baking, presented to me by my sister-in-law and brother-in-law. I have been making Florentines from this recipe for over 12 years, but thought I should probably do some research before baking and writing about them for this post. And I’m glad I did, because I’ve learned a few things… first, despite its name, this lovely biscuit is more of a French confection than an Italian one.

Candied Orange and Dark Chocolate Chip Cookies

I’m a very risk-averse person. Maybe it’s something to do with being a lawyer, but I’m overly cautious and any risks I do take are usually heavily calculated towards producing good results. Which is a long-winded way of saying I need to be a bit more adventurous… with life in general, and cooking in particular. I do believe, truly, that in cooking, as in life, the biggest failure is to be so crippled by the fear of it that one does not try anything new at all. And so, here I am, valiantly trying to stand up with the courage of my convictions and not let the fear of a badly chosen recipe or (even scarier) making up a recipe, stop me.