Lavender Lemonade

After a rough night up late with my sick dog, I decided I needed a little cooking therapy. Nothing quite soothes me the way lavender does, as is obvious by my blog name, right?

Friends and family have known for years about my passion for lavender and they often give me some as gifts. What’s great is there are so many sources for culinary lavender now and each one has its own unique flavor. Here’s a sampling of the packing you might see.

 
It’s a beautiful spring day here in Arkansas and I’d recently given my lavender lemonade recipe to a friend so the choice became obvious. 

2 ½ cups water

1 cup granulated sugar

1 Tbs dried culinary lavender flowers

1½ - 2 ½ cups cold water (depending on how strong you like your lemonade and how fast your ice cubes will melt – I used 1½ today)

1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice*

Ice cubes

* an average size lemon, especially this time of year will yield just under ¼ cup of juice. Sometimes it takes only 4 lemons to get to 1 cup of juice and sometimes you need up to 8. Today it took 6.

In a saucepan, bring water and sugar just to a boil and stir until sugar is dissolved.

Remove from heat and add lavender. Stir.

Cover and let stand for 1 hour.

Strain lavender syrup through a mesh strainer, discarding lavender flowers.

Stir in lemon juice and cold water.

Serve over ice.

This makes about 4-6 servings but is easily doubled.
Enjoy!

(I’m a little distracted today and accidentally threw the lavender in before the water boiled. No harm, no foul. It was just as delicious. Even us “professionals” make mistakes, too)

Oops! It all worked out.

Mini Whoopie Pies

Living in a new city and state means meeting lots of new people. On my first real dinner party at a friend’s house, I offered to bring dessert.  Knowing my new friend lived in New England for years, I opted for an old favorite, Whoopie Pies. I also knew her 4 year old would be there and long ago I determined that sweet treats are more often eaten if made in smaller sizes, especially for little ones. So… the Mini Whoopie Pies.

I learned something when I made these. Apparently, what I know as Fluff – that gooey marshmallow stuff that you put on peanut butter sandwiches (Fluffernutter), is only known as Fluff on the east coast. The rest of the country calls it Marshmallow Crème. It’s the same thing, just called something else. Oh, and the rest of the country doesn’t know of Fluffernutter sandwiches. How sad!

Cakes:

2 cups all purpose flour

½ cup cocoa powder (if you have Dutch process, us it. I had plain old Hershey’s cocoa powder and it worked splendidly)

1¼ tsp baking soda

¾ tsp Kosher salt

1 cup buttermilk, shaken well

1 tsp good vanilla extract

1 stick unsalted butter, softened

1 cup light packed brown sugar

1 large egg, room temperature

Filling:

1 stick unsalted butter, softened

¾ cup powdered sugar (or to taste)

2 cups marshmallow fluff (or crème!)

1 tsp good vanilla extract

Cakes:

Preheat oven to 350˚F

Whisk or sift together the flour, coca powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl.

Stir buttermilk and vanilla in a measuring cup (you have to measure the buttermilk anyway, why dirty another bowl?!)

In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat together butter and brown sugar with the paddle attachment, at medium high speed (3 or 4) until pale and fluffy. (Should take about 3 minutes). You can use a hand mixer, too, but it’ll take a little longer.

Add egg and beat until combined, about another minute. Make sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl as you go. 

Add 1/3 of the flour mixture, then half of the buttermilk, another 1/3 of the flour mixture and then the remaining buttermilk mixture and then the remaining flour mixture. You can stop the motor as you add in each addition so you don’t make a mess. Make sure the stand or hand mixture is on low for these steps or you will be covered in flour and cocoa powder. Beat until the mixture is smooth. It should be a light and airy batter – not thick.

Spoon 1 Tbs mound of batter onto baking sheets covered in either buttered parchment paper or silicone mats (Silpat), spacing the mounds about 2" apart. 

Bake about 10 minutes, switching positions halfway through, until the mounds are puffy and spring back when touched lightly.

Transfer to a rack to cool completely.

You should get about 40 cookies, if you don’t nibble on the batter. 

Filling:

Using the cleaned out bowl of your stand mixer, beat together the softened butter, powdered sugar, marshmallow fluff (crème) and vanilla with the (cleaned) paddle attachment until it’s smooth and shiny.

Tip: Measuring the fluff is the hardest part because it’s so sticky. Spray the inside of a 1 cup dry measure (or 2 cup if you actually have one of those!) before filling it with the fluff. This will prevent it from becoming a sticky mess.

Assembly:

Using a small offset spatula or piping bag, spread a thick layer of filling on the flat side of one cookie. Then gently press another cookie on top of the filling to make a sandwich. 

Store in between sheets of wax paper for up to 3 days. Enjoy!