Mocha chocolate chip cookies

1-1/2 tablespoons instant coffee granules or instant espresso powder
1-1/2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tablespoon hot water
2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup unsalted butter, cut in 8 pieces, at room temperature
3/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
3/4 cup sugar 2 large eggs
1-1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1-1/2 cups semi-sweet chocolate morsels (can use half white chocolate morsels)
1 cup nuts (optional)

Makes 36 cookies

Heat oven to 350F and line 3 cookie sheets with parchment paper or grease with butter.
Combine coffee granules, cocoa powder and 1 tbsp sugar.  Mix well and add hot water to dissolve.
Cream butter, then add sugars. Blend well, then add eggs and vanilla and beat until creamy and well blended, then add coffee/water/cocoa mixture.  Combine flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder and add to wet ingredients.  Mix until just blended and then add chocolate chips and nuts.
Drop rounded spoonfuls of dough onto cookie sheets, leaving at least 2" apart.  Bake for 15-18 minutes, until edges have set but centers are still soft.  If you are prefer a chewy cookie to a fluffy one, remove cookies after appx 10 minutes and bang pan onto counter a few times until cookies deflate, then return them to the oven to finish baking.
If any of the cookies are connected to each other, use a knife to separate them when still hot.  They will firm up a lot when they cool, so don't be afraid to remove them from the oven when they're still pretty soft.  Allow to cool on cookie sheet for 5-10 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool down to room temperature.

Commentary: For those of you who bake a lot, you may recognize the base recipe for Nestle Toll House Cookies, with a bit of coffee granules, cocoa and water added.  However, I like the flavor and texture a lot better, since I've never been able to get the Nestle recipe to work right for me and tend to get fluffy or mushy cookies rather than crisp yet chewy ones like everyone else seems to make.
If you don't have expresso powder, you can use 2 tbsp coffee in place of the espresso powder and water, or you can use those disgusting Folgers granules that your parent(s) left at your house nine years ago (true story).

The recipe is adapted from one I found on the Cuisinart website. It works fine in there but is a lot easier to go old school and make it in a bowl.  Only try this if you have a full size food processor.  I have an 8 cup one and it was just a tad too small.

Nice buns..

As always, recipe first, commentary at the end...

Buttery Rolls or Buns (adapted from King Arthur Flour's website)

• 1/2 cup (120g) sourdough starter, ripe (fed) or discard
• 3 cups (361g) All-Purpose Flour
• 2 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast
• 1 tablespoon (14g) sugar
• 1 1/4 teaspoons salt
• 1 large egg
• 5 tablespoons (71g) melted butter
• 2/3 cup (152g) lukewarm water

If you don't have a sourdough starter, add an additional 1/4 cup water and flour

1. Combine all of the dough ingredients in a large bowl, and mix and knead — using your hands, a stand mixer, or a bread machine set on the dough cycle — to make a soft, smooth dough.You may need to add a bit more flour so that it's not sticky.
   
2. Place the dough in a lightly greased container in a warm spot and allow the dough to rise for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, until it's just about doubled in bulk.
   
3. Gently deflate the dough, and transfer it to a lightly greased work surface.
   
   
4. For cinnamon rolls or other spiral dough -roll and pat the dough into a rough rectangle approximately 12" x 16". Melt 2 tablespoons butter in a small bowl. Spread melted butter onto dough and add any topping (e.g cinnamon sugar and nuts, cheese, or everything bagel seasoning, etc). Starting with a long side, roll the dough into a log.Cut the log in 1" slices, using a sharp knife, or a piece of dental floss looped between your fingers. Lightly grease two 8" or 9" round cake pans. Arrange 8 buns in each pan. If you want to do loaves, cut roll in half and put each piece in a buttered loaf pan.
   
   5. For buns, stretch dough into a symmetric cylinder.  Cut in half, then cut each section in half, then repeat process two more times so that you have 16 dough pieces.  Shape each piece into  a ball, and place in 2 greased round cake pans or use a 9" x 13" pan.
   
   6. For loaves, divide dough into 2 pieces, shape into logs and place in buttered loaf pans.  Alternately, for pull apart slices, cut dough into 16 pieces as described above, roll into logs the width of your loaf pans, and arrange in a row in 2 buttered loaf pans.
   
   7. For monkey bread, grease a bundt pan or two loaf pans.  Pull off 1" pieces of dough, roll in melted butter and then cinnamon sugar, and place into pan(s)
   
   For all variations.
   Cover the pans, and let the buns rise for 60 minutes, until they're noticeably puffy. Don't let these buns rise too long; you want them to have enough rising power left to expand nicely in the oven. Towards the end of the rising time, preheat the oven to 350°F.Uncover the pans, and brush each bun with  melted butter. (you don't need to do this for the monkey bread)
   Bake for 22 to 25 minutes and 35-40 minutes for loaves or monkey bread loaves. They'll color only slightly.
   Remove the buns from the oven and cool.
   
   Commentary. You can tell if a recipe on the King Arthur Flour website is good by how many reviews it has and how many stars it has.  This one is both popular and highly ranked.   They're soft and tasty and are my go-to recipe for rolls for Thanksgiving, Easter dinner or sliders.  I've made these at least 5 times and usually do a double or triple recipe of the plain rolls and freeze most of them. To freeze, just separate a section of rolls and wrap well with plastic wrap.
   
   For more variations, check out the comments on the King Arthur Flour website.
   
   
   

Snarky Fangirling Lia Ices

I was listening to my usual Amazon Prime music station in lab the other day and a song that I'd never heard before came on.  I played it several times in a row and liked it even more each time.
The singer, Lia Ices, is a singer songwriter.  To me, her voice sounds like a young Sinead O'Connor sang a Cocteau Twins song, but there are also similarities to Kate Bush, Tori Amos, and Florence and the Machine. 
After listening to a bunch or her songs, I looked her up. Dear readers, if she didn't sounds like an angel I would be seriously snarky because she seriously does not fit my image of someone who sounds like Sinead O'Connor meets Cocteau Twins. I don't hate people because they're beautiful but I could almost come close here because her life is so over that top that I'd like to trade places with her for a few days.  She's got that tall pretty bohemian look and is married to a heir to the Mariani dried fruit empire who owns an organic vineyard in Northern California.  There were multiple articles about her in Vogue, including her snark-worthywedding, her makeup routine, etc etc.  She's been recording music since 2008, but since I'm an out of touch old biddy who doesn't read Vogue I was totally clueless. 
Here's the song that got me hooked despite being a cranky old biddy who'd be shocked that her favorite new artist is a rich girl Vogue Instagrammer type. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfrwEyyRsIY

the magic of perimenopause, part 2/n

And, just like that, my ovaries turned back on and my internal furnace shifted back to normal levels. All of a sudden I have a normal heat tolerance again.  Probably not coincidentally, I am finally able to sleep deeply and not wake up from being too warm.
I am celebrating this momentous occasion by drinking a lot of caffeine and attempting to catch up on a year's worth of sleep.  However, I am hedging my bets by not putting the flannel sheets or comforter back on the bed just yet.

FU - media, part 1/n

Bringing back the short format without links since I have a lot to say and a short attention span...
Can we please stop throwing our female presidential candidates under the bus?  Please just focus on articles on the latest Trump fuckups and let the voters decide who they want in the Democratic primary.  It's really obvious now that there are multiple female and minority candidates for president. Hollee fuck this is getting annoying.  Do the math.  Raising 3% less money than Joe Biden in three months is not a sign that doom is imminent, nor is one generic tweet that says essentially the same thing as all the other candidates regarding Trump's attack on Iran. The media glorifies all the white guys, ignores the qualified male minority candidates and giddily throws the female candidates under the bus one at a time to maximize their views. 
On a related note, can we please stop acting like Pete Buttiegieg is a super genius because he went to Harvard and got a Rhodes Scholarship without also mentioning that Cory Booker did pretty much the same, albeit he went to Stanford.  Likewise, Julian Castro also went to Stanford.  The only reason I know these things because I'm also an alum from the same era. Sheesh.