Tuesday Tricks and Treats: Pin yourself to a book

I took a wee hiatus from blogging for a few days so I could focus on some writing and editing work I had to get done. Sometimes unplugging, even just partially, can be a real boon for productivity.

TRICK: A college roommate used to do this and I realized how ingenious it was and started doing it too. I've been doing this for over 10 years and it saves time, money, and socks!

Inevitably, you've lost some socks in the wash. And the ones you don't lose you have to spend time putting together and folding before stashing them (unless you just give up in frustration and dump all your socks into a jumbled mess in a drawer--if that's your style, more power to you!). Instead of driving yourself batty, use a safety pin to pin your socks together before you throw them in the laundry basket. It keeps them together in the wash, the pins don't rust or anything, and when you take them out of the dryer, not only are they all there, they're already clipped to their mates and ready to be tucked away in a drawer. I haven't lost a single sock since I started doing this. This is especially handy when you have socks that are the same color but slightly different patterns or textures. Those are a real bitch to match up and fold. The pin eliminates this.

Just leave the pins in when you put them away. Then, when you put them on, stash the pin somewhere like your dresser. Repin before tossing in your laundry basket.

TREAT: I'm a bookworm. I love to read and always have. And I've always felt guilty when a book was sort of out of commission for reading, whether it was because it was damaged in some way or even just terribly bad. What to do with that book? I could never bring myself to toss them. Thankfully, there are numerous creative artists who repurpose books and give them new life as art objects.

Here are a few images of some amazing sculptures made out of books. 

My fellow blogger over at Foxtail Sun also has an entry where she shares some more images of beautiful artwork made of books.

Which is your favorite? What do you think about repurposing books to make other objects? Is it awesome or an aberration?

Organic produce: what's a girl to do?

If you're anything like me, organic and natural can cause some confusion. Yes, I know that foods that are natural are good for me, and yes, I feel like foods that are organic are probably even better, but unfortunately, my wallet doesn't always agree with me. I try to get as much organic produce as I possibly can, but let's face it: sometimes I just can't find or can't afford to get every fruit and veggie organic. Then I am wracked with guilt and worry. Will I die because I got something non-organic that might have harmful pesticides? Am I contributing to the destruction of the earth because the sale on non-organic carrots was too good to pass up?

The internet to the rescue! A few years ago I had seen this extremely handy site that features a card-sized list you can clip and carry in your wallet that lists foods you should always choose organic versus foods you can get nonorganic without worry. Then, like many good things I find on the internet, I lost the website before I could bookmark it. It's back, and now I want to share it with you. Go to the site to cut out the list to carry with you. And for the sake of convenience, here are the two lists.

THE DIRTY DOZEN (always buy organic)

1. Celery
2. Peaches
3. Strawberries
4. Apples
5. Blueberries
6. Nectarines
7. Bell Peppers
8. Spinach
9. Kale
10. Cherries
11. Potatoes
12. Grapes (imported)

THE CLEAN FIFTEEN (lowest in pesticides)

1. Onions
2. Avocados
3. Sweet Corn
4. Pineapple
5. Mango
6. Sweet Peas
7. Asparagus
8. Kiwi
9. Cabbage
10. Eggplant
11. Cantaloupe
12. Watermelon
13. Grapefruit
14. Sweet Potatoes
15. Honeydew Melon

Interestingly enough, I already sort of tend toward these lists in my current shopping habits. I try to always get organic spinach, celery, apples, and berries. And some of the clean fifteen foods simply aren't available as organic options at my local supermarket, so I just get my non-organic asparagus because I can't pass up eating asparagus. But now I know that it's okay to eat it, non-organic and all.

Of course, we're left to wonder where along the pesticide spectrum other forms of produce we eat fall. (WHERE ARE CARROTS?) But this small guide is at least a good start, and I think the main Food News website yields even more information about this stuff. What are your thoughts on organic produce? Do you religiously buy all organic? Or do you think this is all an elaborate hoax set up by the government and food industries to get us to spend more money on food?

Recipes that go on your face rather than in it

The recipes I'm linking to might not actually be for anything to eat, but they are all made with edibles. They are DIY natural beauty treatments, like masques, scrubs, and soaks. It's common knowledge that many foods help different parts of our bodies with antioxidants, vitamins, and other healing effects when we eat them, but slathering them on ourselves is apparently another effective use for them.

Recently, I've been moving, slowly but surely, away from beauty and personal care products laden with synthetic and, quite frankly, scary chemicals toward more natural skin care, and many of these products are full of foods (and plants and minerals) with different healing and fortifying properties. Conventional skin care tends to be filled with preservatives that extend shelf life at the cost of pumping a product full of chemicals. These chemicals are absorbed by our skin and thus into our bodies. And while it does seem too soon to tell what sorts of long-term effects these products might have on us, the very fact that they might even HAVE long-term effects on us that are undesirable is enough to make me think twice about using them for the rest of my life. So I'm gradually swapping out my traditional skin care products as I finish each for natural alternatives.

It's nice to know, though, that you can make cost-effective and easy pampering products at home, because skin care can get expensive. I've certainly tried a few of these, like using honey to moisturize or cucumber slices or cold used tea bags on puffy, tired eyes. But I'll probably whip up a few of these concoctions next time I feel dehydrated or in need of a boost. One thing I learned recently is that apparently lemon juice applied to a bug bite as soon as possible after you get it helps soothe the itchiness and irritation. Plus who doesn't love the smell of lemons?

Do you find yourself feeling the same way about skin care products, or does the use of chemicals not bother you? Have you ever tried any home remedies using common kitchen ingredients that you find to be highly effective? Dish!

Less is more: learning a kitchen mantra

One of my favorite food-related phenomena is what I refer to as the Fridge Factor. This is when you're hunting around for something to eat and realize that you just so happen to have everything on hand that you need to create a favorite dish that suits your current mood. It is a happy accident, an aligning of perishables and pantry shelves that points you in the direction of the dish you didn't know you could make but are happy that you can.

This happened to me this weekend. I was in the mood for something fresh and crunchy on Saturday, and when I opened my fridge, figuring I'd make a salad, my eyes fell first on the two-pound container of strawberries I got at Trader Joe's for a bargain price and then on a box of baby arugula, my favorite salad greens. My brain spun a bit, and I remembered that I'd gotten some blue cheese for an endive salad we had earlier in the week. Then it spun some more when I remembered a bottle of vanilla fig balsamic vinegar I found in the Home Goods section of Marshall's (really!).

What a perfect combination: peppery, bitter arugula with sweet strawberries, salty-sour blue cheese, and the tangy sweetness of balsamic vinegar. Four ingredients, a simple combination, but one that made my mouth do a little happy dance.

As I started to slice my strawberries, I began having second thoughts. Perhaps my salad was TOO simple. I did, after all, have some grape tomatoes I could slice up and also add to the salad. No, I told myself, tomatoes will be too much. They will add acid that might not gel with the rest of the salad. Hold off.

But I still felt uneasy. When I went to the pantry, I still found myself in this mentality of more is better. My eyes scanned the shelves. What about some slivered almonds? How about pine nuts? I could add some olive oil.

Trust yourself, woman. Four ingredients is fine, I had to assure myself. Your first thought was your best thought. These four things are all ingredients you adore. Your instinct to put them together was right, but don't make a muddle of things by forcing more guests to the party. More is not always better. Just stick with what you have.

So I did. Arugula, strawberries, blue cheese, vinegar. I assembled the salad slowly, feeling the light, dry arugula leaves give under my hand as I piled them into the bowl, carefully cutting the berries into neat, thin, round slices. I shook out just enough of the gloriously stinky blue cheese that it looked like a snow flurry, not a blizzard, had hit the bowl. I opened the bottle of vinegar and inhaled deeply. It had that lovely, heady balsamic smell to it, with just a hint of dessert to it. I slowly drizzled it over the salad and wiped up a drop from the rim of the bottle with my finger. The vinegar was a rich brown color speckled with fig seeds. The vanilla really mellowed out the vinegar's acidic flavor. It wasn't an overwhelming addition; it just enhanced the vinegar and made it taste a little more special.

I dug in. The salad really did it for me. Everything combined in just the right way to make for a satisfying lunch. The textures, the mixture of salty and sweet and bitter and tangy flavors, combined in a way that was just right. I was so glad that I didn't go overboard and start adding ingredients just for the sake of having more on my plate. This was definitely a case of less is more.

The more I cook and learn about food, the more I realize that less is more is probably the best mantra you can recite in the kitchen. You must trust yourself. When something seems to be at just the right balance of flavors and textures, stop. Don't second guess yourself. Leave it be. Chances are, your first thought was the best thought and was correct. You don't have to add dozens of ingredients to make a wonderful and impressive dish. This is not to say that having many ingredients is a bad thing. It can be essential. I think of something like mole sauce and respect the fact that it takes a lot of ingredients and time and patience to make it perfect. But then I think of something like the humble lentil soup I make from time to time for an easy, filling dinner, and I realize just how important it is to have less rather than more. Onions, carrot, celery, and garlic cooked in some olive oil, with lentils and water, salt and pepper. It is so simple, and yet so amazingly satisfying. Every ingredient gets to be a star in this show.

By honoring technique and treating ingredients kindly, with respect, you will get amazing results no matter how few things go into your pot or bowl. Finding ways to coax pleasing flavor combinations out of seemingly ordinary foods often leads to extraordinary results. Putting browned meat into a pot with wine and a few aromatic vegetables and letting it braise slowly for hours in your oven will give you an amazingly complex, beautifully textured dish, without a long list of exotic ingredients. It is the care and attention you put into your meals that will give you the best results, not bottles of truffle oil and jars of caviar. These things are all well and good, but they are certainly not necessary for you to feel like a queen when you sit down to dinner. Knowing that you created something that will tempt and delight you will give you a satisfaction that no bottle of expensive wine ever could. This is what I learned this weekend when I made my humble yet not-so-humble simple salad of arugula, strawberries, blue cheese, and vinegar.

Baked eggs

My love of all things Mark Bittman is pretty obvious all over this blog, and is also evidenced by the fact that whenever someone asks me what my favorite cookbook is, I say, without hesitation, "How to Cook Everything by Mark Bittman." I love him and this book because it was the first resource I turned to in order to learn to select and prepare food properly. His book taught me how to properly cook a scrambled egg and how to turn Brussels sprouts from a stinky, soggy mess into something crisp and divine. But the reason I love him the most is because he taught me how to make baked eggs.

Baked? EGGS? Yes, my friends. YES.

I too had no idea what these were until I perused the section on eggs in his book. In his book he discusses how baked eggs (also known as shirred eggs) have fallen out of favor, and he rightfully says he has no idea why. Baked eggs can be made in casserole form but since I just eat two, I prepare them in ramekins, which are small, porcelain custard cups that can be purchased in varying sizes. I love ramekins. They are the perfect place to stash small things, place cold eggs when allowing them to come to room temperature, and are essential to making things like creme brulee. Plus, you can move them from freezer to fridge to oven to microwave. I love multi-taskers in the kitchen! As your blogger, I advise you to make haste to a kitchen supply store and pick up at least 2 of these for your home, if not 4... or 6.... or 8.... you get the idea. They are not expensive and might run you two bucks each. So if you like eggs, get yourself some ramekins and make this recipe. (In a pinch, very small tea cups could also be used. Not large mugs, but smaller ceramic tea cups. Or you can use a bigger Corningware or Pyrex dish, as I mention below.)

The beauty of a baked egg is that you can really make it with any accompaniment you want. Put some cream in the bottom for a luxurious texture. Tomatoes are glorious. Throw in some cheese. I recently made spinach-parmesan baked eggs and wanted to cry, they were so delicious.

Preheat the oven to 375. While it heats up, put a frying pan on medium heat. After a few minutes, add a generous dollop of olive oil. Once the oil is hot, add a passel of fresh baby spinach leaves (this recipe, by the way, is a perfect way to use up spinach leaves that are just past the peak of freshness but not yet gone bad) and stir constantly. Once they have begun to darken and wilt, add a clove or two of minced garlic and a pinch of salt. Stir until the leaves are dark and wilted and the garlic is fragrant. Remove from heat and place the spinach in a bowl or dish.

Grab your microplane (another must-own item if you don't already have one) and grate yourself a generous couple of tablespoons of fresh parmesan cheese. Don't even try to get away with using that powdery sawdust that comes in a can. BLASPHEMY. Once you start using freshly grated parmesan you will wonder how in fuck they can pass that canned shit off as edible. (My father rightly says that the Kraft parmesan smells like feet. Real, fresh parmesan has a tangy, salty, beautiful smell and in no way resembles powder when it is grated.) A wedge of fresh parm will keep in your fridge for weeks, because it's an incredibly hard cheese. Just wrap it in plastic wrap and stash in a small plastic container. My parm has been in the fridge since January. It had a spot or two of mold on it, but a little mold never killed anyone. The beauty of parmesan is that you can easy trim off any moldy spots with a sharp knife. It doesn't affect the taste of the rest of the cheese.

Grease the inside of two small ramekins with a little butter or olive oil. Divide the spinach into the bottom of each cup, then top with a layer of the parmesan. Carefully crack an egg into each ramekin, being careful not to let the yolk break. The yolk and white should completely cover the spinach-parmesan nest at the bottom of the cup.

Take a metal or glass oven-safe pan and place the ramekins in it. A square brownie pan is perfect for this purpose as the ramekins will fit snugly within (see photo below). Carefully pour hot tap water into the pan so that it comes up the sides of the ramekins just past the point where the egg is in each cup. This warm water bath will help the eggs cook evenly and will prevent brown, overcooked edges.

Bake them for about 12 minutes. You want to remove them from the oven when everything looks just barely set. The whites should be white and the yolks should be pale. The hot ramekins will continue cooking the eggs, and you want them to be just a tad firm, but not so firm that the yolks won't be scrumptiously runny. Carefully remove the ramekins from the pan and set them on a plate. Sprinkle the top of the egg with just a pinch of salt.

These are best eaten with a spoon, so you can savor every last bit. The yolks stay gloriously runny once you pierce them, and the whites are soft. The whole thing is like an unshelled soft-boiled egg, but with glorious treasures at the bottom. The spinach with parmesan was gloriously but not overly salty and a nice mix of textures. The yolk mingles beautifully with the wilted leaves and the whites melt in your mouth. Seriously. These are THAT GOOD. They are an easy, hearty, and luxurious dinner, and would go well with a silky, cream-based soup.

 

Behold! The glory of the baked eggs, straight from the oven.

If you don't happen to have two small ramekins, but have one of those circular Corningware or Pyrex dishes, just prepare the dish with both eggs in it in your larger round dish. I just really like preparing each one separately because come on... how adorable are those ramekins?

Try this and then tell me how OHMIGOD good it is.

More soup + peanut butter cookies, two ways

A batch of muffins, a pot of soup, and two batches of cookies. Yeah, I spent the weekend in the kitchen.

For soup, I made a variation of Mama Pidal's lentil soup, except using the cleverly packaged Goya 16-bean soup mix. I love bean soups because they are filling and also freeze excellently for future meals. I added the usual mirepoix, plus spinach and two packets of Goya sazon, along with some onion and garlic salts and the requisite salt and pepper. It made a LOT of soup, which is living in a giant pot on my stove top. In my dream world, I would have a giant pot of soup simmering on my stove top every day. One of my favorite smells is the blend of aromatics as they hit the soup pot, before they start cooking. If I could bottle it and sell it, I would. I'd call it Essence of Soup Pot---you could just have the odor of fresh soup pervading your kitchen, whether you were cooking or not. Yum.

Jeremy was an absolute gem today and cleaned the house while I sat on my ass drinking pumpkin spice coffee watching Project Runway on On Demand. So as a reward, I made him not one but two batches of peanut butter cookies. Because why stop at just one peanut-buttery treat? He deserves double the fatty delicious love. I made a batch of peanut butter oatmeal cookies and another of peanut butter molasses. I've made the latter before and brought them to work to share, and they were literally such a hit that the pile of them disappeared in just a couple of hours. I saw that I was on to something really good here, so I think these might be my secret weapon cookie. I feel like I could win wars (and hearts) with these things. (I also feel this way about my red velvet cupcake recipe.) So unfortunately, I'm keeping that recipe to myself.

But fortunately for you, I'm not a total selfish brat, so I do want to share the peanut butter oatmeal recipe with you. These cookies are AMAZING! They are so dense and filling. The recipe author, Nicole Rees, suggests arming yourself with a glass of milk, and I agree. So, make haste! Get thee to the oven and make these cookies. They are scrumptious.

CHEWY PEANUT BUTTER OATMEAL COOKIES - by Nicole Rees

• 3/4 cup oil
• 1/4 cup water
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
• 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1 large egg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup plus 2 tbsp all-purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 2 1/2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
• 1 cup raisins or chocolate chips (note: I skipped these and found the cookies perfect without them)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Beat oil, water, and sugars, until smooth. Beat in peanut butter until well combined. Stir in egg, vanilla and salt until smooth and creamy.

Stir in flour and baking soda until almost all combined. Stir in the oats and raisins or chips if you're using. At this point, it will be a workout for your biceps to get a spoon through the dough. Allow the dough to rest at room temperature for 10 minutes.

Line baking sheets with parchment paper.* Drop walnut-sized chunks of dough, about 2 tablespoons, onto baking sheets, spacing at least 1 1/2 inches apart. (I found it easiest to scoop up a glob of dough with a metal dining spoon and then gently shaping it into a ball with my fingers; don't overhandle or the dough will get melty.) These cookies don't spread very much, which is nice

Bake for 13 to 14 minutes, until golden at the edges and puffed in the centers but not quite set. Don't overbake! Allow to cool for 3 minutes on cookie sheet before transferring to wire rack to cool completely.

*Using parchment paper on cookie sheets? A revelation. No need to grease the sheets, which always leads to greasy clean-up later. No burnt bottoms. No cookies sticking to the sheet. All around a fabulous tip. I'll never grease cookie sheets again, and neither should you. Thank you, Nicole Rees.

Olive oil pancakes and brown sugar bacon

I love pancakes, and nothing says "It's the weekend, sleep till 11 and stay in your jammies all day" more than a stack of pancakes with a cup of coffee. The fabulous Jose Andres has a recipe for olive oil pancakes in his book Made in Spain that are positively delicious.

I will admit that this Sunday was the second time I'd made them but the first time I'd made them properly. The first time I got halfway through the recipe before realizing that he calls for buttermilk, not milk, so I fudged and used soy milk. They were all right but nothing fabulous. But the buttermilk really makes a difference! Don't skimp: do it right!

These pancakes are soft, fluffy, and almost creamy-textured. The olive oil taste is light but lovely. Definitely give them a try. (Seriously, it's not that hard to put together a good basic pancake batter, so kick that box of pancake mix to the curb and DIY. SO tasty!) Jose recommends serving these pancakes with honey, which I did, and which was a great accompaniment.

Olive Oil Pancakes by Jose Andres

• 1 3/4 cups flour
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1 1/2 cups buttermilk
• 4 tablespoons best-quality olive oil, preferably Spanish, plus more for frying
• 1/3 cup chopped dark chocolate, preferably Spanish

1. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Whisk in the egg, buttermilk and 2 tablespoons olive oil until the batter is smooth, then stir in the chocolate pieces.

2. Heat the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a medium sauté pan over medium-low heat. Ladle one-fourth cup of the pancake batter into the pan and cook until golden brown, about 2 minutes. Flip the pancake with a spatula and cook until golden brown on the second side, 1 to 2 more minutes. Place the pancakes in a warm oven until all are cooked and ready to serve. Repeat with the remaining batter, adding more olive oil to the pan as needed.

Here is a video of Jose making the pancakes!

TIP: I know pancakes can be tricky--my first attempt at them resulted in a lot of burnt pancakes, some completely blackened, and a lot of smoke, and maybe 2 edible pancakes in the whole lot. The trick is to keep the heat very low, and to remember that the first pancakes you make will take longer to cook than the pancakes after them. This is because the pan or griddle will get progressively hotter, so always count on the first pancakes to take longer than subsequent pancakes, and don't use the cooking time of the first ones to gauge the cooking time of the rest of them. You may need to regrease your cooking surface at some point during your cooking process.

Flipping pancakes can also be a messy and agonizing process. An easy way to tell if they're ready to flip is to observe the edges of the pancake. If there are a few tiny bubbles forming along the edges and the edges seem to have taken on almost a filmy-looking quality (like it looks a little more solid than the liquidy center of the pancake), you are ready. I'm not describing this very well but you'll know it when you see it. Slide the spatula under the pancake (I wiggle it gently to get as much of the pancake on the spatula as possible) and flip quickly. The trick to not making a battery mess is to keep the pancake as close to the pan's surface as possible. Keeping your finished pancakes inside of a casserole dish with a cover will keep them warm until you serve them. Some people recommend keeping them stacked on a cooking sheet inside a low-heat oven, but I find my casserole dish improvisation works just as well. Pancakes cook quickly, so the time between cooking and serving them isn't huge.


PAIR YOUR PANCAKES WITH BACON!

I haven't tried this recipe personally yet, but a friend of mine just served this bacon recently at a bridal shower brunch and it was so good all of us had seconds. The baking method for the bacon is better than just frying it in a pan, or so I've heard. I'd line the baking sheet with foil before adding the wire rack, to make clean up that much easier. (Just lift out the greasy foil, voila!)


Gina's Brown Sugar Bacon 

• 1/4 cup light brown sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne
• 1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
• 1/2 pound thick-cut bacon, 8 slices

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Mix brown sugar, cayenne, and black pepper together in a medium bowl. Add bacon and toss.

Line a baking sheet with a wire rack and lay bacon on the rack. Pat any remanding spice mixture on the bacon. Put the baking sheet on the top rack of the oven and bake until crisp, about 15 minutes. Remove from the oven to a serving dish and let cool slightly before serving.

BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS! :)

Yield: dozens of cookies ahead

So when you decide to make cookies, before you do anything else, read the yield.

As in the part of the recipe that tells you how many cookies the batter you make will produce. Because last night I decided to make some cookies (oatmeal with pomegranate jelly) and was halfway through the batter before I noticed this all-important number.

You'd think that after preparing and beginning to make a batter that calls for two sticks of butter and three cups of flour that I'd realize there would be a serious amount of cookies resulting, but no. I thought it was a little odd, but not extraordinary. But then I looked at the yield, after creaming said two sticks of butter into two kinds of sugar: 4 1/2 to 5 dozen cookies.

SIXTY COOKIES? WTF!

In for a penny, in for a pound (of butter, it felt like). So I soldiered on. And the cookies actually turned out really well. Yes, I was in the kitchen for like two hours, but once things turned into an assembly line sort of system, it really wasn't so bad.

Here's something I discovered. I only own two cookie sheets, and for this particular recipe, I could fit 12 cookies on a sheet. So I baked one sheet at a time, and after removing the cookies, I put the hot, empty sheet in the fridge for a few minutes while the second sheet baked. This cooled the sheet to room temperature so that I could add more dough to the sheet. (You should never put raw dough on a hot cookie sheet, because it'll melt the fats in your dough and mess it up.) After refrigerating, I was also able to scrub off any jelly spills with a wet paper towel. This made the baking process go much faster because I didn't have to wait for each sheet to cool for who knows how long before proceeding.

Here's the recipe. It originally called for raspberry preserves, but I had a jar of pomegranate jelly in my kitchen that just wasn't getting used up (it's not terribly compatible with peanut butter), so I used that instead. And please note that it really does make like 60 cookies or so. They are small cookies, and yummy, so that shouldn't be a bad thing.

Oatmeal and Jelly Cookies
4 1/2 to 5 dozen

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup butter (two sticks), softened
1/2 cup water
1 tsp almond extract
2 eggs
3 cups all-purpose/unbleached flour
2 cups quick-cooking rolled oats
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
fruit preserves, jam, or jelly (I really think any flavor will work!)

Heat oven to 400 degrees F.

In a large bowl, beat brown sugar, sugar, and butter until light and fluffy.

Add water, almond extract, and eggs and blend well. The mixture will look curdled and watery.

Stir in the flour, oats, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon and mix well. The mixture will thicken and look lumpy

Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets. With a spoon, make an imprint in the center of each cookie and fill the imprint with 1/2 teaspoon of preserves. Drop a bit of dough over the preserves on each cookie.

Bake for 6 to 9 minutes until the cookies are a light golden brown. Immediately remove from cookie sheets and allow to cool on a rack.