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Ball Plastic 8-Ounce Freezer Jars, 5 Pack

Ball™ Brand Plastic Freezer Jars and Containers are the perfect all around storage solution that helps you capture fresh and easy recipes. Our plastic jars and perfect for storing freezer jam, fruit sauces and fresh cut fruit for snacking while the plastic containers can handle soups, leftovers and frozen vegetables. All of our plastic jars and containers are BPA-free plastic and are dishwasher safe on the top-rack. Fill line on jar indicates where to fill to allow food expansion during freezing. Jars are stackable and lock together for a tidy freezer. Twist on lids seal in the freshness and prevent leaking. Sturdy plastic is more durable than plastic bags. Freezer safe - straight jar sides allow for food expansion during freezing.

Chocolate-Raspberry Shortbread Sandwich Cookies

Ingredients
1/2 cup cornstarch
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 cup sifted flour
3/4 cup butter
Seedless raspberry jam
Bittersweet or semi-sweet chocolate chips (1/2 a bag to a bag)

Directions
Stir the cornstarch, sugar, and flour together in a large bowl. Mix butter in with your hands to form a soft dough. Gather into softball-sized balls, flatten into 2-inch thick disks, wrap with plastic, and chill for about 45 minutes (You want the dough stiff enough to be manageable, but not so stiff that it's too hard to roll out).

Roll chilled dough out to about 1/4 innch thickness, using powdered sugar on your work surface instead of flour. Cut into simple shapes (circles, squares, hearts - don't use complicated shapes, as the dough is way too delicate). Bake in preheated 350F oven, on parchment covered cookie sheets, for approximately 12 minutes, or until lightly golden just around the edges. Remove to cookie rack and let cool completely.

Spoon about 1/2 of a small jar of seedless raspberry jam into a small bowl and stir until smooth. Spread about a teaspoon of jam onto the bottom of one cookie (don't go all the way to the edges) and then gently press another cookie on top of the jam, bottom-side to the jam. Place on waxed paper-lined cookie sheet. When all cookies are sandwiched, put cookie sheets into the fridge.

In a double boiler (or in a microwave) melt the chocolate chips at a low heat, and then spoon into a ziploc baggy. Pull the cookies out of the fridge, and cut a small corner off the ziploc baggy, and simply drizzle the chocolate across the cookies, working diagonally. When all the cookies are drizzled, pop them back into the fridge (or freezer, if you have one big enough), to set the chocolate.

Once chocolate is hardened, pull the cookies off the waxed paper, and break off any stray bits of chocolate. Store in a covered container, in between layers of plastic wrap or waxed paper, and keep refrigerated until ready to serve. I'd tell you how long you can keep them in the fridge, but honestly, they've never lasted more than 8 hours. I take them to work in the morning, and they're gone not long after lunch.

Notes: I make these for Valentine's Day, and hardly ever at any other time of the year. Depending on the size of your cookie cutter, I'd suggest doubling or even tripling the recipe above. For one thing, these are very delicate, and so break extremely easily. For another, you need two plain cookies to make each complete cookie. So make more than you think you'll need -- you can always bake the rest as plain shortbread cookies, if you want to.


February 13, 2007.

I have to admit -- a week before, I would have thought "man, it's going to be microwave and oven bake frozen food for a while." Instead, I'm definitely experimenting, and while I still make mistakes, I'm learning from them too.

- ALMOST had the milk+water solution boil over when making the Knorr Sidekick three-cheese pasta.
- Added too damn much water into the condensed soup of cream of mushroom. GAHHH, why can I not get it right?!

Still, I realize I'm no chef, and I know that I'm probably never going to make it past "awesome", but I can at least get to decent I think some day.

I also like being in complete control of my diet. I've generally eaten well the past month while working out, but I plan to push it now with carrots and asparagus in lieu of apple slices.

I also have an overabundance of leftovers as I don't think I ever believed that I'd actually make decent food to eat. Nor did my parents. But now it's a race to properly multitask all these leftovers!

And I can definitely say that I can start to understand how adults are time constrained. Between dishes, cleaning up, and the actual cooking, I'm a bit exhausted. I can only hope it gets easier with time.

I'm also starting to understand why people seem to enjoy talking about cooking food as much as eating it. It's the anticipation of tastiness. I've learned one thing -- never cook on an empty stomach. Cook when you're sated, but ready for the next meal, your appetite will be HUUUUGE.

See that ziploc bag sitting on the top shelf beside the juice? That is Uncle Rudy's special smoked sockeye salmon. Man oh man, I cannot wait to put that with a beautiful spinach or mixed green salad with italian dressing. Oh yeah!