Apricot and Ginger Butter Cookies

As I sit here typing in my pearls and apron ( and pj's) I have realized that a new baking genre is before us. We have successfully baked our way through the first half of "Its all About the Cookies" cookbook with Author Sharon. And our next half of the books' Author is Theresa. Which means only one thing, new ingredients. Just when I thought I had done it all, Section 2 kicks in and is ready and eager to show me some new ingredients as well as techniques. love it.

Once I read that I needed dried apricots I thought, this will be a quick trip to Kroger. However, after the apricots it asked for crystalized ginger? Something I don"t think I have ever heard of. My next thought, this is not going to be a quick trip to Kroger. Once in my car I had folded to the idea that I would have to go to Vince and Joes to get my crystalized Ginger. Still not sure if this is a ginger root that I am going to get to zest or something entirely different. But instead I called my standby Kroger to see if they had this item in stock. When the customer service person put me on hold I figured might as well turn right and drive the distance to V & J. Surprised again when the stock manager got on the phone and said he had it!!!! yippee. There it was right next to the regular ginger but this bottle with the crystallization was $9.99. Oh well at least the drive was short. Then off to get my dried apricots near produce. I started to panic, could it be this was the specialty item they might not have? Nope, they had it as well. My only question is there were 2 brands 1 from Turkey which was cheaper and the other from the Mediterranean. Does it matter? Another surprise was there was a different style of crystalized ginger in produce, that were not in the rock formation but more like an elongated apricot. They were only $2.00 guess what I put back?( see attached)

The recipe called for them both to be finely chopped. Let me give you a big tip. Do not put these in your processor. My mini broke. So with the knife I chopped. I hope these were fine enough.

After these small insights it went pretty smooth. That is until I asked my Sioux chef Jack to help on the dry ingredients. He put them together for me then I told him to pour it into my butter/sugar mixture slowly. To me that meant a little at a time, to Jack that meant all at once somewhat slowly. I yelped and he jumped. Then we laughed. I was afraid it would not come together if the flour was poured in all at once. However the baking Gods were with us and all was good.

The "Pearl Girls" prevail!

Thanks Theresa for waiting so patiently for us to get to your recipes. Its gonna be fun. Angie