This was a Pillsbury Bake Off recipe* but it is in many other places on the Internet like Cooks.com. The cookie is just a basic shortbread so the filling and icing really make them.

I leave out the nuts, of course. Since I always like cookies better without the nuts, I usually make them first without nuts and only try them with nuts later if it seems like they are missing something. These are not missing anything.

Recipe By:

Pillsbury Cookoff

Yield:

24

Ingredients:

1 ½ cups butter, softened

1 ½ cups powdered sugar

½ teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 ½ cups flour, 11.25 ounces

6 ounces cream cheese

2 cups powdered sugar

1 ¼  cups  flour

1 cup walnuts, chopped

1 cup coconut

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup chocolate chips

¼  cup  water

¼  cup  butter

1 cup powdered sugar

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Cream 1 1/2 cups butter, 1 1/2 cup powdered sugar, salt, and 2 teaspoons vanilla.

3. Add 2 1/2 cups flour gradually. Mix well.

4. Shape into balls of 1 tablespoon each. Press onto ungreased cookie sheet. (I use parchment.) Make thumb print in center of each cookie. Bake 12-15 minutes until just browned around the edges. Top with filling while still warm.

5. Mix cream cheese, 2 cups powdered sugar, 1/4 cup flour, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Stir in walnuts and coconut. Put about 2 teaspoons on each cookie while still warm.

6. Melt chocolate, water and 1/4 cup butter. (I use double boiler.)  Remove from heat.

7. Add 1 cup powdered sugar. Beat until smooth. (It will look curdled at first but will smooth out if you beat it will with a hand mixer.) Frost cooled cookies with about 1 teaspoon frosting on each cookie over filling. I put it in a quart-sized Zip-Lock bag, cut off the corner and gently squeezed the icing out over each cookie.

Notes:

* http://www.pillsbury.com/recipes/chocolate-buttersweets/08cb366f-709b-4cb3-ae56-722ea919722a

I have a couple of stories to tell you that have to do with clothes.

Always Fashionable.

The first patient was a twenty-two year old man who was drunk and crashed his car while racing. He came by ambulance, escorted by the arresting police. He was strapped to the spine board, swearing at and flipping off everyone who tried to help him. He was thrashing around so much we had to sedate him in order to perform studies on him to be sure he was not injured internally.

Several x-rays, scans and hours later, he was ready to go to jail. When he stood to go, it was clear he needed some help with his pants. In order to expose his legs, the medics had slit his long, baggy pants up the front of both legs from the hems to the waistband. When walking, they flopped around has legs so much I was afraid they would trip him. I had him lie back down, grabbed my trauma shears and cut the pant legs off about the level of the hems of his boxers. When he stood again, it was clear they were so loose might fall down when he walked so I grabbed some strips of gauze and tied a loop between the front two belt loops and synched the waist to keep it up around his hips. I was feeling really good about my efforts on his behalf until he stood again to go. The last thing he did before they handcuffed him with his arms behind his back was to grab the waistline of his newly formed shorts and tug them down off his hips so he could be fashionable as he headed off to the hoosegow.

Super commando

There is no rule saying everyone must wear underwear. Yet, I can tell you after many years of seeing people in various stages of undress that the vast majority of people in our society do so. The term for going without underwear is “going commando.” In the emergency department, when I picture going commando, I picture a dirty homeless man or a woman in a very short skirt who was beaten up by someone she expected to pay her for some services rendered. Let me tell you about one patient going commando that was a unlike any other I have ever seen.

She was a nineteen-years-old trauma patient who came in, as they usually do, all strapped down to a spine board. She was nervous but pleasant and cooperative (unlike the first guy) and was dressed in a large, thick, white terrycloth bathrobe. As we got the straps off the board and started to examine her, we realized she had nothing on under the robe at all.

The story was that she got in an argument with her boyfriend. He got mad, bolted to his car and took off. She ran out, got in her car and sped after him without bothering to get dressed. She then drove in a crazy manner that lead to the crash. Fortunately, she was not seriously injured and was soon released into the custody of the waiting Highway Patrol.

Someone referred to her as going commando to jail. Then someone else joked that she was actually going “super commando” as she walked out, hands cuffed behind her back, wearing only her white terrycloth robe.

Some more blue bags nicely placed on the bed.

I first found Ginger-Lime Chewies at Better Homes and Gardens*. I liked the zippy taste but didn’t really like the texture so I came up with my own. They are not hard to make and “get right in your mouth” as my father would say.

Ingredients:

2 ¼ cups sugar

2 
tablespoons finely shredded lime zest

1 
tablespoon peeled, grated fresh ginger

½ cup butter, softened

½ cup shortening

2 egg yolks

1 ½ tablespoons fresh limejuice

1 
teaspoon lemon or vanilla extract

2 ¾ cups flour, 12.5 ounces

2 
teaspoons ground ginger

2 teaspoons cream of tartar

1 teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

Directions:

1. Position a rack in middle of oven. Heat to 400 degrees. Prepare baking sheets by lightly greasing or covering with parchment. Set aside.

2. In a food processor, combine sugar, lime zest, and fresh ginger. Cover and process for 2 to 3 minutes, scraping sides of bowl occasionally, until ginger is completely pulverized and mixture is thoroughly blended and smooth. Remove 3/4 cup, transfer to a saucer and set aside.

3. In a large bowl combine remaining sugar mixture, butter, shortening, egg yolks, lime juice and lemon or vanilla extract. Beat with an electric mixer on low, then medium speed, until very well blended and lightened in color, about 2 minutes.

4. Combine flour, ground ginger, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt. Beat in half the flour mixture on low speed just until evenly incorporated, scraping sides of bowl occasionally. Stir in remaining flour mixture until evenly incorporated.

5. Cover and refrigerate until it is firm enough to handle.

6. Form balls of dough with a 2-tablespoon cookie scoop. Roll balls in reserved sugar mixture, coating about half the surface. Place balls, sugar side up, on prepared baking sheet.

5. Bake 6 to 8 minutes or until edges are light brown and cookies are not quite firm when gently pressed in the center. Let cool 5 minutes to firm up. Using a spatula, transfer cookies to wire rack to cool.

Notes: Here is the BH&G original: http://www.bhg.com/recipe/lime-and-ginger-chewies/

The triage nurse at the front desk makes a brief note of a patient’s chief complaint. Here are a few unusual ones.  These patients didn’t have anything interesting wrong with them but their complaints were noteworthy.

Big Time Wrestler

A professional wrestler was uninjured during his bout at the fair grounds. Afterwards, someone hit him on the back of the head with a bottle and he was brought in by ambulance, still in his wrestling costume and strapped to a spine board. He denied any symptoms. “I’ve had three concussions and I know I don’t have one now,” he assured me. He seemed to have no injury and was discharged.

Bit by a Dead Hamster

A woman called the emergency department and told the nurse a family member had been bitten by a dead hamster. She was wondering what they should do.

Bus Ride Too Far

An elderly man got on the bus to go from one town to another about 70 miles away. He fell asleep and missed his stop. He snoozed for another two hundred miles. When he finally woke up, he got off the bus in our city. Having no way to get back to where he really wanted to be, he called 911 and was brought to the emergency department.

From Hickeys to Bruises

A thirty-five-year-old woman came in complaining that her boyfriend had struck her on the back and elbow. The only abnormalities on her physical examination were the multiple hickeys she had on her neck. When asked about them, she said they also came from the boyfriend but “before this all started.”

Wanting to Look Good

A 74-year-old woman took ill and hurried to the emergency department. She said she came in sooner rather than later because she didn’t want to be a bad-looking corpse.

Caught His Penis In the Mattress

A nineteen-year-old said he cut his penis when he rolled over and caught it in the spring of an old mattress.

“It must have been a really old mattress,” I observed.

He later admitted he was “messing around with my girlfriend” when it happened but was too embarrassed to admit it.

Bit by His Cousin

A 4-year-old boy was brought in by his grandmother. He was complaining of pain in the penis.

She said she placed the boy and his 5-year-old cousin in the bathtub to bathe. The boy splashed water on his cousin. That made the cousin got mad and he bit the patient on the penis.

The boy’s penis was swollen and purple.

Certified Wart-Free

A man in his twenties came in for a certification that he had no venereal warts. His ex-girlfriend had told his present girlfriend that he had given the previous girlfriend genital warts. His present girlfriend was refusing to have sex with him until he presented her with a certification that it was safe.

Victoria gave her Tad Bag to her niece who took it when she went back to Ghana for a visit. She brought me this light brown bracelet as a thank you. A nice addition to my collection, don’t you think?

McCormick shares recipes like this to get you to buy more spices. When I was unable to find ancho chili pepper at my Nob Hill, I just went to the freezer and pulled out the bottle of dried, ground chiles I bought from a little lady while eating lunch in a market in Valladolid, Yucatan, Mexico last year. The McCormick propaganda said they would have “a hint of smoky heat.” Mine certainly had more than a hint. I am looking forward to trying them as written when I get some ancho chili pepper.

Source:

McCormick advertisement in a Better Homes and Gardens magazine I was looking through at my mother in law’s over Thanksgiving.

Makes:

32

Ingredients:

24 ounces semi-sweet baking chocolate, divided

1 ½ cups flour, 6.75 ounces

4 teaspoons McCormick® Gourmet Collection Cinnamon, Saigon

2 teaspoons McCormick® Gourmet Collection Chile Pepper, Ancho

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

½ cup butter, softened

1 cup granulated sugar

½ cup firmly packed brown sugar

4 large eggs

4 teaspoons McCormick® Pure Vanilla Extract

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 375°F.
2. Melt 16 ounces of the chocolate. (I use double boiler but you can melt it any way you want. Just don’t get it too hot.) Set aside.
3. Coarsely chop remaining 8 ounces chocolate. (I used chocolate chips so no need to chop.) Set aside.
4. Mix flour, roasted cinnamon, ancho chile pepper, baking powder and salt in small bowl. Set aside.
5. Beat butter and sugars in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy.
6. Add eggs and vanilla. Mix well.
7. Add melted chocolate. Beat until well blended.
8. Gradually beat in flour mixture on low speed until well mixed.
9. Stir in chopped chocolate.
   10. Drop dough by 2 tablespoons or medium cookie scoop 1½ inches apart on parchment paper-lined baking sheets.
   11. Bake about 10 minutes or just until cookies are set and slightly cracked on top. Transfer cookies on parchment paper to wire rack to cool.

 Alternative:

Roasted Ginger Chocolate Crackled Cookies: Prepare cookies as directed using 16 ounces semi-sweet baking chocolate, melted, and 8 ounces bittersweet baking chocolate, chopped. Use McCormick® Gourmet Collection Roasted Ground Ginger in place of the Saigon Cinnamon.

These are easy to make. They come out  firm and compact. Almost like eating candy.

Recipe By:

Elaine Thompson in Mercury News

Yield:

24

Ingredients:

½ cup butter, softened

1 can sweetened condensed milk

2 cups fine graham cracker crumbs

¾ cup flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

1 cup English toffee bits

 Directions:

1. Heat oven to 375 degrees. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.

2. Beat together butter and sweetened condensed milk.

3. Combine graham cracker crumbs, flour and baking powder. Stir into butter mixture.

4. Stir in chocolate chips and toffee bits.

5. Using a 2-tablespoon cookie scoop, drop dough onto cookie sheets.

6. Bake 10 minutes. Remove to rack to cool.