Chocolate-cranberry Cookies with Self-rising Flour

It was picnic time for my kids' Chinese class and I signed up for dessert. I thought I would make some chocolate-cranberry cookies. This time though, I altered the recipe I posted long time ago by using the self-rising flour I had plenty on hand. Here is what I did.

3/4 cup (1&1/2 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup packed light or dark brown sugar
1/4 cup orange juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large egg
2&3/4 cups King Arthur unbleached self-rising flour
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips or chunks
1 cup dried cranberries
3/4 cup chopped pecans or walnuts (optional)

Yield: 4 dozen

In a large bowl, cream together the butter, sugar, orange juice, vanilla and salt.

Beat in the egg until combined. Add the flour, mixing until smooth. Stir in the chocolate chips or chunks, cranberries and nuts. Drop by the tablespoon onto the foil-lined baking sheets. Bake at 375 Fahrenheit for about 12 minutes, until just beginning to brown around the edges and the tops. Remove from the oven and let cool.

Since I only have one oven to work with, I slid the entire foil lining with the baked cookies onto the cooling rack. Put a new foil lining onto the baking sheet for the second batch of cookies to bake. By the time the second batch was done, the first batch has cooled down enough for me to take off the foil to store. Then I put the emptied-out foil lining back onto the baking sheet for the third batch to bake in the oven after the second batch was moved to the cooling rack. This method worked out quite well for me by alternating the foil between batches.

Cranberries-chocolate cookies

Good Friday, bored at home but wanted to do something, naturally my mind went to food. Hmm...what should I make? I thought of looking at the flour packages to see if there is anything I want to try this time. After glancing at the ingredients and the cooking instructions, I found one! It was on the side of King Arthur's unbleached whole white wheat flour package: cranberry-chocolate cookies. It was a little before 10:30 in the morning, perfect time to try something new. I changed the amount on a few ingredients to accommodate my family's taste. The recipe is as follows:

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
3/4 cup packed light or dark brown sugar (I used only 1/2 cup and it was plenty sweet)
2 tablespoons orange juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large egg
1 1/4 cups King Arthur White Whole Wheat Flour
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips or chunks (I used about 3/4 cup chips)
1 cup dried cranberries (I used a scant 2/3 cup)
3/4 cup chopped pecans or walnuts (I used 1/2 cup walnuts)

Yield: 2 dozen

In a large bowl, cream together the butter, sugar, orange juice, vanilla, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

Beat in the egg until combined. Add the flour, mixing until smooth. Stir in the chocolate chips or chunks, cranberries and nuts. Drop by the tablespoon onto the foil-lined baking sheets. Bake at 350 Fahrenheit for about 12 to 14 minutes, until just beginning to brown around the edges. Remove from the oven and let cool. My leaky old oven took about 16 minutes on the baking, but they were mighty tasty. Hubby even made a comment that the cranberries and walnuts added complexity comparing to the plain chocolate chip cookies, and he rated these as his top choice.

All right, here comes the hard part, posting a picture of it. I'll have to stick a post-it note to remind myself as I have no doubt I'll forget to take pictures of the food I intend to share. Fortunately this time I remembered before the cookies are gone.

Cranberries-chocolate Cookies