If you were to draw a horizontal line, through a map of Italy, at Rome, you would have what we call the "butter belt." Cooking above that line, very much relies on butter, rather than olive oil. Below that, it's olive oil.
There are exceptions of course, but this is a very general rule. The same general rule holds for France, although of course, the line is not through Rome. In Spain, not so much, and certainly not in Mediterranean Africa. Be this as it may, it points to the need to know geography to understand cooking: if we are looking at a region which is very much flat, so that animals can graze, we are going to have a cuisine that is based on animal fats and dairy. If, on the other hand, the land is mountainous, or there aren't very large plots of land to give grazing space, we go to plants. And one can subdivide as well, into what suits cows (larger spaces), as compared to sheep (smaller ones), and goats (the Masters at "dealing with it," foodwise), and so forth. So, when you eat a sheep's milk cheese from Italy, ragazzi, it is almost always going to be from the south. And when you eat a cow's milk cheese, from the North.
Now what does this have to do with cookies? Well, if you're not used to Annalena's digressions yet, shame on you. Read some more. Last week, she read a recipe from Dorie Greenspan, describing a cookie based on olive oil. Ms. Greenspan explained that it was from the Languedoc-Rossillon region of France (and Annalena will not undertake to pretend she knows French geography), which put it in the olive oil belt, and it was based on olive oil.
Well... Annalena does not have an olive oil cookie recipe. As she read on, she was intrigued, because Ms. Greenspan spoke of how while SHE had put vanilla into the recipe, the originals called for orange peel or anise.
Hmmm. Annalena is getting more and more curious. And as she read through the recipe, she noted: no eggs. No butter. Could this be? Is this a cholesterol free cookie?
Yes, ragazzi, it is. Is it healthy? No carissimi, it is not. What is it called?
As they say in French Je ne sais pas. That's "I dunno" for those of you even less literate in French than is Annalena. She did her research, and could not find the name. All of that aside, these cookies are good. And they have an interesting aspect: their flavors change over time. The Guyman and Annalena ate one, warm out of the oven. Then another, about four hours later. VERY different. At that point, they were still "dessert cookies." As Annalena writes this, they are more "something with coffee cookies."
They are easy. VERY easy. Just have patience in shaping them. This is what they look like when they're done:
And here we go. You need just under 3 cups of flour that you will combine with a half teaspoon of baking powder, and half of that, of salt. Put that aside.
In your mixing bowl, add 3/4 cup of sugar and the grated rind of one large orange. Now, get your fingers in there and work them. Just rub them together, until the oil of the orange has begun to make the sugar somewhat sandy, and you can smell that wonderful fragrance. NOW, add all that flour, and stir it together. Pour in half a cup of olive oil. Here, whatever you use doesn't matter, but for heaven's sake, use something good. And then add half a cup of sweet , or off sweet , white wine. At least that's what the recipe called for. Annalena picked up a bottle of sweet, alcoholic apple cider from Vermont and used that. It worked just fine. Finally, add a small, half teaspoon of vanilla.
You are probably going to need your hands to knead this together. You can use a mixer, but why would you? In any event, mix it up until you get a smooth, somewhat soft dough. It will feel like bread dough. Then, break off pieces about the size of a walnut. Roll them into small cylinders, and then , at the ends, press down with your thumb and pinky. This is counter intuitive, because you WANT to use your thumb and forefinger. Trust Annalena: you will get better results with the pinky, and you'll improve your manual dexterity somewhat. After you do that, roll them again, gently, to get a sort of round "belly" in the middle, and then dip the cookie into granulated sugar, before you put it on a baking sheet lined with parchment.
You're going to need two sheets here, because you'll get 36-40 cookies. They don't spread much, but still you need room. Bake them at 350 for 20-22 minutes. Half way through, rotate the sheets.
If you eat them when they are warm, they will be very soft and the orange flavor, faint. Later in the day, the edges will be crispy, and the orange will come out, big and strong. The next day, everything crisps up, and the orange becomes a bit less prominent.
And there you have it. America wrote a song called "A horse with no name," and now, Annalena has given you a cookie without one. But if you CAN give her a name for these ( a real name, ragazzi, not Pierre or Rousseau or something silly), please lte her know.
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