Big P, Little p, What Begins with P?

Last evening brought to you by: the letter P. My filmmaker came over for an impromptu play date; we nibbled on some pretzels and goat cheese cheddar, which did not exactly taste reminiscent of cheddar but had a nice goat flavor and a firm texture, while coloring with some permanent markers. I am working on a large sketch pad of drawings to give to him, eventually; they are rather geometric and biologically inspired. We also shared a bottle of prosecco and baked some absolutely delicious peanut butter cookies.

One of the best design aspects of these vintage champagne and cocktail glasses is the hollow stem; it adds some color to the translucent glass, and when drinking something bubbly, creates a tame volcano of effervescence. The wide, round shape is so idyllically retro.

My pink ice bucket, thrifted some time last fall from a consignment shop. It is displayed prominently with my cocktail and collins glasses on my dry bar table.

In keeping with the theme for the evening, the filmmaker came bearing a present, with a pirate twist: an eye-patch. I have been teasing about wearing one of these when we go out and about, so now I can finally don this one night and give my heavy eye shadow a rest.

The peanut butter cookies came from an adapted Betty Crocker recipe. As I have said before, she may be fictitious, but that cartoon diva has some great baking tricks.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup shortening, softened (butter or margarine can be substituted)

1/2 cup peanut butter

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar, packed

1 large egg

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

cinnamon to taste

My butter was in the refrigerator and not quite softened; I expedited the process by letting him hang out by the roaring front burner for a few moments. This is probably not advised, but it worked. As an amateur and budding domestic goddess, sometimes you have to be resourceful and adapt to the environment at hand, even if that environment stems from your own poor preparation and planning.

I used creamy, unsweetened peanut butter. Since the cookies have so much sugar added as it is, the unsweetened, natural variety allows for pure peanut flavor to power through.

First, measure the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon in a smaller mixing bowl and set aside.

I love the look of freshly opened peanut butter; so flat and smooth. Peanut butter pond.

In a larger mixing bowl, I added the butter, sugar, and peanut butter, then mixed these ingredients thoroughly. It required some intense bicep work to get all the ingredients well incorporated.

Then I added the large egg, and mixed some more.

After the wet ingredients were all together, I added the flour mixture slowly, making sure it was well incorporated after each new addition.

The pan should be ever so slightly teased with some grease. Roll the dough into roughly one inch balls, and make sure they are evenly spaced out, with plenty of stretch room as they bake.

I wielded a floured fork to cross-hatch each cookie, for a more decorative appeal. They know vaguely remind me of the golden quilted earrings I wore Saturday night, featured in my previous post. Not quite a golden ratio-like monumental coincidence, but a nice pattern.

The cookies should bake in a 375 degree oven for about ten minutes, maybe twelve, depending on the size of the dough balls. The final product was absolutely delightful. We each ate a belly-full of cookies before retiring, to watch the conclusion of the film "The Saddest Music in the World"; it is a hilarious and beautiful satire, with rather strange, emotively incandescent lighting and camera effects, which visually appear to capture some by-gone, twisted era.

For some type of finale, two looks that I would love to promenade about in, from the Proenza Schouler Fall 2011, debuted last week in New York. Both of these dresses are a bit outside of my typical sartorial comfort zone, from a palette and a pattern perspective, but sometimes you need to push yourself out to the edge and pry away from preconceived conventions.

(Proenza Schouler images taken from Fashionologie)