Sending you warm and sweet wishes for this time of year

If all else fails, bake some cookies

Hi friends! I’m sure you’re all in the midst of frantically sending a few last emails/wrapping a few last presents (or starting to wrap presents, if you’re like me)/packing to head home or on vacation, but I wanted to send you all an email to spread some holiday cheer and also share a good cookie recipe before the end of the year!

Before I get to the cookies, some book news: I did an interview with People this week about Flirting Lessons, (my next book!) and it included a little excerpt of the book! It comes out on April 8, 2025 (which is in just about three and a half months!), and I can’t wait to share it with all of you! Preorders are huge for books and authors; I’d love it if you could preorder Flirting Lessons (links are all here!), or to ask your local library to carry it! We are planning a book tour now, and the best way for me to be able to come to your city is for you to badger your local bookstore or library to get me to come!

And speaking of local bookstores, books make fantastic last minute presents, and if you have a bookstore near you, you don’t even have to wait for shipping! This is not a best of the year list, but here are a handful of books for all ages that I enjoyed this year and would happily give to friends and family! Children’s: What Can A Mess Make, Dog’s First Baby, Touch the Sky, The Ofrenda That We Built, Shut Up, This is Serious. Fiction: God of the Woods, The Wedding People, It’s Elementary, Margo’s Got Money Troubles, Housemates, The Great Divide, Murder at the White Palace. Romance: The Partner Plot, This Could Be Us, Here We Go Again, A Love Like the Sun, Isabel and the Rogue, At Her Service, I’ll Have What He’s Having. Non Fiction: The Last Fire Season, Be Ready When the Luck Happens, There’s Always This Year. Cookbooks: What Goes With What, The Big Book of Bread, You Gotta Eat, Chinese Enough.

Okay I’m sorry that this list got so long, I really meant to give you just a handful, and then I kept thinking of more books and adding them and I’m cutting myself off now (even though I’m sure I’ve forgotten at least five books that I loved), but rest assured that I’ll send you a new list in the new year of books I loved from 2024 and also books I’ve already read that are coming in 2025 that I’m excited for you to read!

And finally, a cookie recipe! Or rather, two cookie recipes. I’ve made quite a few different kinds of cookies in the past few weeks, including these Neapolitan checkerboard cookies. Here they are, aren’t they pretty? I made them for a party last weekend and hoped towards the end that they didn’t taste good so I’d never have to make them again, and alas, they were delicious, so I made them again for my cookie exchange this week. The recipe is lengthy so I’m not typing it out for you, but I have a few notes for you on the recipe. One, it says in the recipe to wrap each dough in plastic and pat them out into a 5inch by 10inch rectangle as soon as you make it, and yes, do that, but what I did the second time was to put each dough into a gallon size freezer zip top bag as soon as I made it, and pat it out in the bag—it’s so much easier, it’s less messy (because these doughs are pretty crumbly), and the gallon bags I used were exactly 10 inches long, so it made it super easy to measure. Two, the first time I made these, the strawberry and the chocolate doughs were VERY crumbly and hard to arrange in the checkerboards; the second time I made them, I used ten fewer grams of flour in the chocolate and strawberry doughs, and they behaved much better. Three, you only need to reserve one egg white for the end of the recipe, you use it as glue to stick the different doughs together (the recipe has you reserve all three whites, you can use the other two for something else). Fourth, you really do need the overnight rest in the fridge (or at least four to six hours in there) after arranging the checkerboards; I only gave it about two hours the second time, and they needed more time for the squares to all stick together with the egg whites. And finally, if you want the strawberry dough to look nicely pink, add two drops of red gel food coloring to it (the first time I used one drop, not enough; the second time I used three drops, a little too much). You do not have to do this, it just makes it a little prettier!

But if you want a simpler but still very delicious recipe, here’s one! These Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies are from a recipe someone made at my cookie exchange last year, and I immediately made them a few days later. I was glad that she told us a few hints she learned from the comments, and they made the recipe far less fussy to make and still delicious! (The original recipe has you freeze the marshmallows and then refrigerate the dough and then combine them later, which makes the dough hard to work with; this way is messy but much easier). These use cayenne in the dough, which give them a little kick and make them perfect for a grown up holiday gathering; if you want to serve these to anyone without much of a spice tolerance, you can omit the cayenne.

Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies

1 1/2 cups (192 grams) all purpose flour
1/2 cup (51 grams) cocoa powder (preferably Dutch processed)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon cayenne (optional)
3 teaspoons cinnamon (divided into 2 teaspoons and 1 teaspoon)
1/2 cup (113 grams) (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups (305 grams) light brown sugar
1 large egg, room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Marshmallows, cut in half, or mini marshmallows
1/4 cup (50 grams) granulated sugar

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, salt, cayenne (if using), and the two teaspoons cinnamon. In a large bowl, or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the butter and brown sugar on medium high until fluffy and they’re well mixed together. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until creamy. Add the flour mixture, and beat or fold by hand until the flour is just incorporated.

Scoop the dough into 2 tablespoon or approximately 1 ounce balls, and flatten. Put a half of marshmallow, or 3-5 mini marshmallows, on top of the circle, and wrap the edges of the dough around the marshmallow to tuck it all inside the cookie dough. Put the dough on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet and refrigerate for at least two hours or overnight (I know, I know, but don’t skip this step).

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Combine the 1/4 cup granulated sugar with the remaining teaspoon of cinnamon in a small bowl. Roll the dough balls in the cinnamon sugar (roll them in your hands first to warm them up a little so the sugar sticks to the dough) and put them on parchment lined cookie sheets about 3 inches apart. Bake for 10-12 minutes, until the cookies are a little puffy — depending on how much marshmallow you used, you may or may not see the marshmallow coming through the chocolate. Let cool on the cookie sheets for about five minutes, then put on a rack to cool all the way.

Enjoy, all! I hope the end of this year for you is full of peace and love in the way you most want it to be.

xo

Jasmine