My favorite things to bake at Christmastime...

It's that time. You know... where life starts to look a little bit like this.

Baking cookies will always be my favorite part of December, more than twinkle lights, candy canes, mistletoe, and Christmas trees. For one, let's be real: they're full of butter and cinnamon and sugar and chocolate.

But more than that, it's about making memories. 

Like... I'll always remember my family getting together to make cut-out sugar cookies with vanilla buttercream, how we had no idea the chocolate chip peanut meltaways would make a hundred & twenty cookies, or how the first cookies we make every year (right after Thanksgiving) are raspberry almond shortbread thumbprint cookies... because we absolutely cannot wait one more day. 

How gingerdoodles came out by being way too lazy to bake two batches of cookies: my mom's favorite (gingersnaps) and my dad's favorite (snickerdoodles). 

... or how everytime we make peanut butter cup treats and peanut butter blossoms I somehow end up with the task of unwrapping all the chocolate kisses and peanut butter cups.  

Sometimes you just need to bake for yourself... like when these fluffernutter chocolate gobs went down.

I remember baking a plate of Mexican wedding cakes in high school for a Christmas party... and eating every last one with my best friend before class ever started. 

Or delivering cookie trays to the elderly in our church a few years back, full of peanut butter reindeer cookies, cinnamon sugar cookies, salt river bars, and gingerbread cookie sandwiches and getting totally unsolicited, important life advice in return: go to college, you're much too pretty to work, and get married already.

Last Christmas my mom taught me how to make her homemade English toffee... because apparently my almond cracker candy just wasn't the same thing. 

... and my dad taught me how to make brown sugar shortbread and Scottish shortbread cookie wedges because he felt they were important life skills. 

Inspire me. What are you baking this holiday season? 

Real Life... how to brown butter.

2012 is all about browning your butter. It's the new red velvet, if you will. 

But first: I interrupt this post to bring you the view outside my window...

Ginormous fire. Totally under a "shelter in place" warning. But, no biggie, let's talk about butter!

Brown butter is simply unsalted butter melted over medium-low heat until golden amber and nutty. If you want to get fancy about it, it's the process of separating the butterfat from the milk solids. The milk solids to sink to the bottom and turn a toasty hazelnut color and all is right with the world.

Basically... it's baking magic and I refuse to stop. 

Also if someone could please invent a brown butter-flavored coffee, that would be wonderful. 

Brown butter in action:

These cookies are stuffed full of peanut butter truffles, chocolate chips, and brown butter. It was good living... even if I had to google "question: how exactly do you brown butter?" as I set out to make them.

Brown butter chocolate chunk cookies. That golden color! Put it in your life! 

Cheesecake filling optional/totally not optional at all. 

Andddd... these cookies. See those tiny browned butter flecks? That's where happiness and good times live. 

Can we make this a thing? Can we put brown butter in everything?

And seriously: brown butter coffee. Invent it.

How To Brown Butter

Melt unsalted butter in a small saucepan over medium-low heat. Stir or whisk frequently until it turns an amber-golden brown color, gives off a distinct nutty scent, and little brown bits appear at the bottom of the pan (about 7-9 minutes). 

Keep an eye on your butter as it cooks down; there is a small window between brown butter and burnt butter... it will brown quickly after it foams up and subsides.

Once it reaches this point, remove from heat immediately and pour into a heat-proof bowl to cool.

Magic! Make it happen!

How to bake cupcakes without burning the bottoms.

Let's be honest: sometimes real life is not pulling twelve perfect chocolate cupcakes out of your oven. 

Sometimes it's wanting cake for breakfast, following a recipe's bake-time exactly, and still ending up with cupcakes that burn on the sides and bottoms before they're done in the middle. It's the worst... because no matter how much vanilla frosting you layer on top, once the bottoms are burnt, the whole flavor of the cupcake is ruined. 

Can I share a baking tip I recently learned? 

All those cupcakes need is a little extra something between the baking pan and the heat source to protect the bottoms and sides from burning while the centers finish baking. You could set your pan on a flat baking sheet, but I always have trouble with burnt sides and edges so I was taking no chances. 

I double-panned it!

And it worked!

Simply set your filled cupcake pan inside an empty cupcake pan and bake for the normal amount of time.

And boom. Consistent, perfectly-baked, unburnt cupcakes. Seriously, this simple tip has taken all the stress and uncertainty out of baking cupcakes. Which is the way it should be.

And if you're thinking cake for breakfast... the answer is yes. Always. 

Double-pan it!

P.S. Find these cheesecake-filled cupcakes here.