New Beginnings with Baking Chez Moi and Ladies Pucks

How fortuitous is it that the beginning of a new bake-along coincided with the beginning of hockey season? And, as fate should have it, we baked these beauties, literally translated to "Ladies Pucks," from Baking Chez Moi.

Many thanks to Dorie Greenspan and the Tuesdays with Dorie group for timing the birth of this book and baking group so perfectly to fit the Yale Bulldogs' home season opener. I'm sure that was at the top of their mind, right?

The only way it could have gotten better is if the cookies had been called Palets de Monsieur, since it was technically a men's hockey game at which my cookies made their debut. But I won't quibble: I'm a lady, I eat dainty, vanilla and lemon frosted white cookie "pucks" in the literal way. These men, they eat pucks in a "take my teeth out with a three-inch vulcanized black rubber disc going 90 miles an hour at my mouth" kind of way. 

But I digress.

These cake-like cookies bear a strong resemblance to the classic black and white, minus the black. My chocolate-lovers balked a little at this ("what's the point of a cookie without chocolate?"), but they settled down once they tasted them.

I've written about our hockey obsessions before, so for now, let me just say this:

The super-simple recipe came together quickly and performed well under the scrutiny of some of the most discriminating fans. Unfortunately, we can't say the same for the Yale bulldogs this year. We could be looking at a long and torturous hockey season. Thank goodness we've got Dorie's incomparable recipes to see us through. 

You can download Dorie's recipe here. Check out the other Tuesdays with Dorie participants take on this recipe here.

Isn't this a beautiful tray? My mother painted that flower!