The Sad Tale of Peppernuts...

So if you even remotely know me or my family, you are probably well aware of our countless Christmas traditions: FHE Sleepover under the Christmas tree, light-looking with pizza and the AC on full blast, chorizo & eggs for breakfast Christmas morning, reading the nativity Christmas Eve often acting it out, opening one gift Christmas Eve, waiting until everyone is awake and parents are ready with Christmas music, tree lights, and cameras before going to see what Santa brought, taking turns opening gifts, and one of the most exciting and most anticipated traditions... peppernuts.

Well, apparently this was my first year making them completely on my own. In years past I've made them at my mom's house or Holly's. Last year at Holly's house we used the recipe in the Loveland cookbook but later discovered that that recipe failed to include pepper in the peppernuts. So this year I opted to use the recipe card that I wrote 5 years ago when I left home to get married. I followed the list of ingredients perfectly and was quite pleased with my lovely rolls of peppernut dough perfectly shaped, smooth, and not overly sticky. A few days later I cut and baked three pans. The recipe says to cook them for 9-10 minutes but I didn't take them out until 13 minutes and they still seemed undercooked. After tasting those heavenly and much anticipated peppernuts, I discovered that they weren't so heavenly. They must need to cook another minute or two. So pan #2 I cooked for 16 minutes... too done. Still didn't taste right. Pan #3 - cooked to perfection. But, it was still painfully brutal to make myself eat a handful. What was wrong with me? Had my tastebuds been damaged?!

When Jared got home from work I showed him my lovely tin full of peppernuts and he excitedly grabbed a handful. After eating just 3 he said he simply couldn't eat anymore and he threw the remaining handful right in the garbage! It finally occurred to me that I might compare my recipe card with the Loveland cookbook. I stopped right at the first ingredient and knew my problem...

MY RECIPE CARD. . . . . . . . LOVELAND COOKBOOK
2 1/2 cups flour . . . . . . . . . 2 1/2 cups sugar

Ha! My recipe called for NO sugar! Clearly a problem when making cookies! Yeah, so silly of me for not realizing it when I was making the dough! That's what happens when you try to make/bake with a 1 and 2 year old nipping at your heels I guess... or what happens when you're just plain blonde most of the time :). The problems didn't stop there though. My card was short 1/2 cup of heavy cream, lacked cloves completely, and was doubled up on most of the other spices. I think my mom started doubling her spices when they were getting kind of old. Anyway, it was a complete disaster. So I sadly tossed this whole tin of peppernuts right in the garbage. I made a new batch of peppernut dough and it was oh so yummy in all its sticky glory. I just about threw away the old batch of peppernut dough away, but then I decided that I could try and salvage it with some sugar, cream, and cloves. It had a little different consistency but they were still quite tasty... and edible :)

Anyway, needless to say, I made a LOT of peppernuts this year (which helped me to be more sharing :). And I learned a lesson or two... make sure you add sugar to cookie dough and make sure you have an accurate recipe card.