Traveling Cookies-Traveling Cookies

I'm a copy cat. I admit it. I can't imagine how productive I'd be if I fell in love with other bloggers but for now one has my heart and she's always in my head! It's hard enough to pretend to be her the very little that I do. She is so prolific and talented. Recently she's published a book that I want to get my sticky fingers on, but alas it's in Australia and I am in the US. Of course I'm talking about:
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Lorraine from Not Quite Nigella

I had an opened can of sweetened condensed milk from some Vietnamese coffee adventuring (yet another post) when Lorraine's cookie recipe popped up in my email. The recipe called for 4 tablespoons of the condensed milk. I had that plus a one more cup's worth of milk in my fridge! It was fate.

Actually it's kind of funny because you'll find this celebrated food blogger on the other side of the world where they use funny metric measures and products that I've never heard of. I have to do a little detective work and ciphering to make her recipes work for me. Like "custard powder" what's that? Being clever I figured it's a cousin of pudding mix. A few twitches on a search engine my hunch was right.

Is her condensed milk my evaporated? Did she just assume the "sweetened"? I did and that's what I went with.

Now, I'm not really one to bake "close to scratch" where one adds mixes together. But neither is Lorraine and she was recommending this cookie recipe. (If it goes on a blog it's recommended.) I needed to pick up flour and the pudding is close by at the grocery and there was that sweetened condensed milk mocking me...

So I gave it a shot.

My Amuricanized Traveling Cookies

Her lovely metric version

1 cup butter, 2 sticks of butter
4 T. sweetened condensed milk
1.5 cup flour
1.5 tsp. baking powder
1-3.5 packet of vanilla pudding mix
Sugar to roll dough in, I used terbinado.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Fahrenheit.
In a microwavable bowl that's large enough to mix all the ingredients zap the butter and condensed milk for 15 seconds to take the chill off. Mix until smooth.
On top of the the creamy blend add the flour and baking powder. Blend them together lightly. Don't dig down into the creamy blend. Add the pudding mix and toss with just the flour. Now take the mixer to the batter and combine thoroughly.

Scoop into 24 balls and roll in sugar. Place on parchment lined cookie sheets and flatten with the back side of a fork. Bake 12 -15 minutes.

They are tender and taste very butterscotchy which may have a lot to do with the terbinado sugar I rolled mine in.

So do you have a blogger whom you read regularly? What is it that they do that keeps you coming back again? For me with NQN, it's a blend of admiration for her talent in writing, photography and voyeurism at her travels. Plus her pallet aligns with mine; I love her sweets and her savory foods.

Do you find awkward recipes inviting or off putting? You know ones that don't jibe with your regular cooking? I personally like the challenge.