Holiday Time! White Chocolate Apricot and/or Cranberry Cookies

I'm a bad blogger! I figured with the holidays around the corner I'd have more time to post, but apparently that's not so. Lots of studying and huge chunks of time spent out of the house have me hankering for some quick homemade goodies, of which these do the trick. The recipe stemmed from my mom's original, old-school chocolate chip cookie recipe, but I've made some major changes to get it to the point that it's at below. Just to note, the recipe below is a boubled version of the original, but when we make it at home we always double it (it makes about 18-20 cookies). If you want a smaller batch, just halve all the amounts.

White Chocolate and Apricot and/or Cranberry Cookies

Ingredients

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 white sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla

1.5 sticks unsalted butter (if using salted butter, omit salt below), fridge temperature, cut into large chunks

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt (if using unsalted butter)

1 tsp cinnamon (or a touch more)

1 tsp cardamom

1/4 tsp nutmeg (optional)

1/4 tsp ground ginger (optional)

1/2 bag of white chocolate chips (or chocolate chunks), or about 1.5 cups, or until is looks like enough!

about 1.5-2 cups dried cranberries and/or chopped dried apricots and/or chopped dried figs

approx 1/2 cup walnuts or pecans, broken into big pieces

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 F. With a standing mixer, handheld mixer, or by hand, beat both sugars, eggs, vanilla and butter until combined. Here's where people go wrong - you DON'T want the mixture to be perfectly mixed, you still want chunks of butter! I don'y know why, but it always makes my cookies come out better. To do so, you need to start with butter that's about the temperature of your fridge, not completely melted.

Sugar

Combined initial ingredients

Do not beat it much more than shown here!! There should be chunks of butter still remaining.

Add the flour, baking soda, salt and spices. Mix to combine.

Added flour

Mixing until combined

Add white chocolate, dried fruit and nuts. Mix until just combined. Form into balls and place on UNgreased cookie sheets. Another trick of mine is not to overshape the cookies - you want them chunky and kind of un-smooth (see below). Again, I can't tell you why, but I promise they come out tastier! Bake for 10-13 minutes at 375 F, or until slightly browned at the edges but still puffy at the center. They will continue to cook slightly as they cool. Transfer to rack (if you have one) to cool. Dip in milk and enjoy!

Finishing touches

Wonderful un-perfectly-formed cookies. Look at those chunks! Look at that asymmetry! Exactly what you want in a home-made cookie.

My baking partner

Sometimes when I feel mean, I put batter on Lulu's nose and watch her lick it off. Yes, I'm about 12 years old.

Finished cookies!

Note: For Viv's choc chip cookies, take out all of the spices (cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cardamom...although sometimes I add cinnamon for good measure), and replace the fruit and white chocolate with semi-sweet chocolate chips (NOT milk chocolate - they're too sweet!). Yumyumyum!