Do try this at home Do try this at home (November 25, 2005)

Class offers kid-friendly, holiday baking

by Suman Mudamula

What are holidays without cookies and candies? Just the thought of the aroma of home-baked cookies is enough to make the holidays extra special.

For Palo Altans who wish to impress their families and friends with these traditional culinary delights, 30-year baking veteran Yannette Fichou Edwards will teach time-tested recipes with handy tips for perfect cookie-baking. Her class meets on Tuesday, Dec. 6 at JLS Middle School.

Although the Menlo Park resident has been teaching baking for almost 11 years -- mostly at friends' homes -- this is the first time she is offering classes through Palo Alto Adult School. Edwards' class will cover candied pecans, traditional English toffee, stained-glass maple cookies and brownie toffee cookies.

"My cooking classes are more hands-on and visual," Edwards said, adding, "the how and the why are very important when you bake." Recipes look complex until they are shown, she noted.

Since taking a cake-decorating class at the age of 10, Edwards has come a long way on the baking road. "That class led to more classes and the next thing I know is I have been taking classes for years. My first cookie recipe was a Girl Scout brownie when I was in third grade. It was a party cake made with M&Ms," she said.

Explaining the chosen recipes, 44-year old Edwards said "My Candied Pecans are a great gift when put in a decorative jar with a bow." They can be eaten straight from the jar or used as garnish for salads. "With blue cheese and pear they make a wonderful winter salad. I guess they are more Americana," she said. They do not take more than 10 to 15 minutes and are very kid-friendly, she added.

Edwards borrowed the recipe for her Brownie toffee cookies -- which she claims are "very good" -- from a friend at one of the get-togethers. "It was everyone's favorite. Since you can't have a copyright over a recipe, I use it as my own with a slight variation," she said.

"My personal favorite holiday treat is my English toffee," Edwards said. "They are absolutely delicious." Edwards took cooking classes at Home Chef, a cooking school and store in Palo Alto, before it burned down. "Once the teacher there made English toffee, which did not turn out well. Then I tried mine and it turned out nearly fool-proof, simple and the best recipe," she said.

You need confidence for a successful and error-free recipe, she noted. She ships her friends English toffees sealed in Ziplocs where they stay fresh for a long time. "Since I don't share my recipes, the only way for them to enjoy my recipes is when I send them out," she added. Her English toffee, which does not take more than half an hour to bake, is the only recipe that remains constant on her changing menu for the baking classes every year.

Edwards' taste in European-style baking comes from her family. Her mother is Italian and father is French. "I have been decorating cakes since I was 12," she said. As a child she would decorate a cake for more than two hours only to see it cut up into pieces and devoured by her four brothers within minutes, she smiled.

"None of my recipes are time-consuming. They are all time-tested and true; very accurate," she said. The stained-glass cookies take about an hour and a half to bake. The cookie dough can be made a day to an hour in advance since it needs at least an hour of refrigeration. "The stained glass cookies are very pretty," she said. A cross between cookies and candies, the stained glass cookies need a specific technique for giving it the appearance of stained glass. "They are fun for children's parties," Edwards said.

A full-time travel agent in a Palo Alto travel company and a part-time worker in the hospitality department of the kitchen of Sunset Magazine, Edwards has written two cookbooks. She is a perfectionist when it comes to baking. She throws away anything that comes out imperfect. "I am very discriminatory," she said. "I am currently perfecting a recipe for Rocky Road brownies."

Edwards will offer a Buche de Noel workshop on Nov. 29, where she will show how to make the traditional French Christmas cake -- a Yule log baked with chocolate and rolled with raspberry filling and chocolate butter cream icing as well as meringue mushrooms and marzipan ivy.

"It's an interesting French cake made in a pan, very thin and rolled into a log. We have to cut the ends and frost it with chocolate, and attach mushrooms to the ends to make it look like they are sprouting from the log. The butter cream and frosting is made from scratch," she said.

Editorial intern Suman Mudamula can be reached at smudamula@paweekly.com

Candied Pecans

2 cups packed golden brown sugar 1/4 cup cream sherry 2 tablespoons cream sherry 3 tablespoons light corn syrup 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon 1/8 teaspoon salt 4 cups pecan halves
Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper. Combine first seven ingredients in heavy large saucepan. Stir over medium heat until sugar dissolves. Cook without stirring for about 10 minutes until candy thermometer registers 240 degrees. Remove from heat. Add nuts and stir until syrup begins to look cloudy; return to heat for two more minutes. Divide mixture between cookie sheets. Working quickly, separate nuts with a fork. Cool. Store in an airtight container.

What: Holiday Cookies and Candies Class Where: JLS Middle School, Room 150, 480 E. Meadow Drive, Palo Alto When: Tuesday., Dec. 6, 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. Cost: $45 Info: Call Palo Alto Adult School at (650) 329-3752 or visit www.paadultschool.org.
What: Buche de Noel Workshop Where: JLS Middle School, Room 150, 480 E. Meadow Drive, Palo Alto When: Tuesday., Nov. 29, 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. Cost: $45 Info: Call Palo Alto Adult School at (650) 329-3752 or visit www.paadultschool.org.

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