After cooking for more than thirty years, I’m still amazed how some of the most simple and unpretentious ingredients can come together and yield something amazing.

Case in point…

Tomatoes, Basil, Garlic plus Olive Oil = the best tomato sauce for a plate of pasta. Or replace cooking all of the above and add some burrata mozzarella and you got the best Caprese salad this side of Italy. Dough, tomatoes, basil, olive oil – Hello pizza!

I can go on and on…

So it was no surprise that this weeks choice for our French Fridays with Dorie was one of those recipes that with something as simple as combining butter, flour, water, sugar and salt you get one the most addictive cookie we have eaten in our house to date.

How addictive?

Well, the first time I made it was Monday. Since then, I have made it a total of six times – SIX, in less than FOUR days. If you do the math, it will tell you how popular that cookie was around these parts.

We cannot keep it around long enough to make it pass the day it was made!

Full disclosure? Tomorrow I’m making it again. We are going on a road trip and we need a snack.

And I’m going to play around with it too.

Tomorrow adaptation of this recipe will include adding coconut flakes to the dough and topping it with some lime zest to make it a bit of a sour/sweet/salty cookie.

I have very high hopes for the adaptation version. Because putting the lime in the coconut and … wait, thats a song.

Sorry.

I’m going to totally break ranks from my fellow FFwD cooks, and share my adapted version it with you.

SALTED BUTTER BREAK-UPS
adapted from Around my French Table

1¾ cups all-purpose flour
2/3 cup sugar
¼ cup of coconut
¾ - 1 teaspoon sel gris or kosher salt
9 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
3-5 tablespoons cold water
1 egg yolk - beaten, for the glaze
1-2 teaspoon of grated lime zest

In a food processor, place the flour, sugar, coconut and salt and pulse to combine. Drop in the butter pieces and pulse again until the mixture looks like coarse meal. Now with the machine running, add the cold water, a tablespoon at a time, until the mixture becomes a dough that almost forms a ball.
Prepare plastic wrap onto your work surface forming an “+” and remove the dough to the middle, don’t worry if it’s loose, it will come together. Wrap with the plastic and pat it down forming a square. Place in the refrigerator and chill it for about 1 hour.
When ready to bake, turn your oven to 350F. Line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.
Remove the dough from the refrigerator, unwrap, but do not remove the dough from the plastic. Place another plastic on top and with a rolling pin, roll it into a rectangle that’s about ¼ inch thick. No need to be accurate.
Transfer the dough to the baking sheet.
Beat the egg yolk with a few drops of cold water, and using a brush, coat the surface of the dough with the egg glaze. Using the back of a fork, decorate in a crosshatch pattern.
Sprinkle the lime zest on top and bake the cookie for 30 to 40 minutes, or until golden brown. Transfer to a cooling rack and let it cool to room temperature.

You know what? I’m not going to wait until tomorrow, so excuse me while I close this up and walk over to my kitchen to play around.