I believe it's now officially cookie season

For every meal, I mean

Friends, it’s December. This means we now have less than a month left of this godforsaken year! Yes yes, I know, we don’t know what’s in store for us in 2021, but good Lord, I think we’ll all be happy to say goodbye to 2020. I am very tired of living through a pandemic and not getting to see most of my friends, and the ones I’ve gotten to see it’s from a distance. I miss hugs so much! (I feel like I say that every newsletter, it is true). But the vaccine news has me very optimistic that the end is in sight — not, like, tomorrow, or even in the next few months, but this no longer feels like it’ll never end. So until then, we all have to wear masks, stay away from other people as much as possible, and do what we need to do to keep ourselves okay, which for me will probably be hot baths, good books, and baking one million cookies and then dropping them on doorsteps and waving from a distance at friends.

Speaking of good books! If you have not read Royal Holiday, it is the perfect cozy read for this time of year, and it’s now in a lighter, purple-er, paperback version. My publisher is running a delightful giveaway with it and a bunch of other Christmas books, and a gift certificate to The Ripped Bodice bookstore! Click here to enter!

Also, I’m so happy to see Party of Two on year end book lists! I was thrilled to see it on NPR’s 2020 Book Concierge, Oprah Magazine’s Best Romance Novels of the Year, Insider’s Best Books of 2020, and Kobo’s Top Romance Picks of 2020! And as a reminder, you can get signed and personalized copies of any of my books by ordering from my local indie bookstore, East Bay Booksellers — just order online and put any personalization requests in the notes section in the payment page of your order, and I’ll head there and sign, and they’ll ship to you! If you want them for holiday gifts, order soon, because they need time to ship, and everything is taking longer than normal this year.

If you want a very different, but very delightful, read, here’s a book I read earlier this year that I can’t believe I haven’t talked about in this newsletter yet: From the Desk of Zoe Washington. This middle grade book is charming as all get out — it’s about a twelve year old girl and her love of baking, and her friendship with the boy next door, and it’s also about the letters she writes to her father, who is in prison, and I know, that sounds like it would make it heavy and overwhelming but it’s not, it’s just lovely and smart and thoughtful and I adored it. And as a reminder, I have a page here over on Bookshop with lots of recommendations from me, including all of the books I’ve mentioned in this newsletter.

Cookie time! You all know that I would not deny you cookie recipes, after I put cookies right there in the title. And this is a very easy cookie that we make almost every year in my family: rum balls. (Yes, I should have made a balls related pun in the subject line; I did not — please share your favorite better subject lines with the class). I will give you two recipes for them: the classic ones, and the chocolate version, both of which are delicious. You can use either rum or bourbon for them, I’ve always stuck to rum for the classic ones, because that’s how we always did it, but I’ve used bourbon for the chocolate ones, and liked those a lot. A note: I say to toast, then finely chop the nuts in the food processor — I toast nuts in a dry pan on the stove on low heat; it’s the easiest way to make sure they don’t burn. And when you chop the nuts in the food processor, do this by pulsing them, because you want this to be crushed nuts and not turn into nut butter. Also, both of these recipes can easily be divided or increased (many recipes for rum balls are like this many cups of crumbs or whatever, but come on, we are all working from the same box of vanilla wafers here, this first recipe is for the whole damn box!).

And for those of you who do not drink alcohol and/or are allergic to nuts, do not worry, I’ll have many other cookie recipes for you this month!

Classic Rum Balls

1 11 ounce box vanilla wafers, finely crushed in a food processor (about 300 grams, about 3 cups)
1 1/2 cups walnuts, toasted, then finely chopped in a food processor (150 grams) (you can use pecans or almonds, I just like walnuts better for this)
3/4 cup powdered sugar (90 grams)
4 tablespoons cocoa powder, either regular or Dutch processed (30 grams)
4 tablespoons light corn syrup
1/2 cup rum (you may need a little less or a little more)
Additionally, to roll the balls in: powdered sugar, cocoa powder, chopped nuts

In a big bowl, stir together the crushed vanilla wafers, the nuts, the powdered sugar, and the cocoa powder. Add the corn syrup, and half of the rum, and stir again. Slowly drizzle in the rest of the rum, and stir again, until you can pinch off a scoop of the mixture and form a ball. Use a spoon to scoop about a tablespoon or two of the mixture into balls, and roll with your hands (the size is up to you, I tend to make them on the smaller side). Roll each ball into either powdered sugar, cocoa powder, or nuts, or hell, all three if you like. Put into airtight containers — they taste better after at least a day or so of aging, but I mean, time has no meaning in 2020, so do whatever you want.

Chocolate Rum Balls

24 Oreo cookies, finely crushed in a food processor*
1 cup toasted, then finely chopped walnuts (or pecans or almonds) (100 grams)
1/4 to 1/2 cup powdered sugar (30-60 grams)**
2 tablespoons cocoa powder, either regular or Dutch processed
2 tablespoons corn syrup
1/4 to 1/3 cup bourbon
Additionally, to roll the balls in: powdered sugar, granulated sugar, cocoa powder

*You could use chocolate wafer cookies instead of Oreos, but those are always a challenge to find, and Oreos are everywhere. If you do use chocolate wafer cookies, use the whole box, and increase the powdered sugar by about half.

** I like the lesser amount of sugar in these, since Oreos are already pretty sweet, but this is a pretty flexible recipe; I’d add the lesser amount and then taste, because you an always add more.

In a big bowl, stir together the crushed cookies, the walnuts, the powdered sugar, and the cocoa powder. Add the corn syrup and the lesser amount of the bourbon, and stir, and then add more slowly, depending on if the mixture needs it (take a pinch and see how well they stick together, and also taste to see what you think). Scoop and roll into balls, then roll the balls in powdered sugar, granulated sugar, or cocoa powder. Put into airtight containers, let them age a day or so if you can manage it, and enjoy!

Have a restful weekend, everyone!

Jasmine

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Buy The Wedding Date, The Proposal, The Wedding Party, Royal Holiday, and Party of Two!