Gourmet Gamer Girl is Guided by the Guardians in Making Gjallardoodles!
Fighting Aliens, Exploring the Solar System, and Doing Some Holiday Baking at the Same Time!
Eyes up, Guardian!
By far one of the most memorable lines recited by your faithful companion- Ghost- in the sc-fi hit, Destiny 2. Originally released in 2014, the Destiny franchise has come a long way over the past eight years- with a huge, intertwined story of alien fights, planet exploration, betrayal, love, and friendship that constantly evolves as time goes on. I mean, in what other game can you kill a guy who murdered one of your closest friends, and then become friends with that same guy when he's ressurected as a new Guardian again a few months later? Complicated? Yep. That's whats fun about it!
Ah, that memorable line by Ghost. I can still hear the words ring clearly in my ears- the first time I booted up the Destiny beta on a hot July day in 2014. I was fifteen- a sophomore in high school who happened to be a huge fan of Bungie's other fan favorite sci-fi game- Halo. It was my older brother who convinced me to give the game a try- and try I did. After all, what did I have to lose?
Safe to say, it's become one of my favorite game franchises of all time. Much like my love of Skyrim, my passion for Destiny is fueled by nostalgia- the feelings the story made me feel when I was but a simple sophomore in high school. Now- eight years later- I'm working on my Master's Degree, and the game still brings forth those same nostalgic feelings when I boot up it's successor- Destiny 2- and go on a hunt in space for some new guns to kill aliens with.
The Destiny franchise is simple at it's core despite the intertwining stories that continue to shift as each new season comes out. You are a Guardian. Essentially, you are a space warrior empowered with abilities granted to you by The Traveler, a paragon (of sorts) of the Light- who gives you these powers through your Ghost. You cannot die, and have the ability to control the elements- Arc, Solar, and Void. Your job is to protect the citizens of The Last City by traveling the solar system to defeat the enemies of The Vanguard and The Traveler. That's not including your fight against the forces of Darkness... or the fact that you can also wield it's abilities too...
This is Ghost- or at least my Ghost. He's an ever faithful friend who has helped guide me as a Guardian over the past eight years. Interestingly enough- the actor who does voice work for him has changed over the years. He used to be voiced by Peter Dinklage (of Game of Thrones fame as Tyrion Lannister), but after only a year his entire repertoire of dialogue was re-recorded by a rather famous voice actor- Nolan North- who took over the role, and has been playing him ever since. I was really angry about this decision when I was fifteen, but as time goes on I don't think I could see anyone else as Ghost than Nolan. We have been guarding The Last City for years together, at this point, dear reader!
Now, Destiny gives you the choice of three classes when you start the game. You can play as a Hunter (sort of a stealthy space ranger/ninja type character, who moves fast), a Titan (a space berserker tank), or a Warlock (essentially? Space wizard!) I've been playing Destiny since the beta came out, and I've always played as a Hunter. I was drawn to the cape, and honestly? It's the reason I stayed. Capes are cool!
Now, I suppose you may be wondering why I'm talking about space wizards and fighting aliens- and how in the world that ties back into cooking. See, much like every other game we've talked about thus far- Destiny also involves cooking! Many of the fan favorite characters enjoy certain meals like ramen or baked goods. Those baked goods are why we're here today, and what I plan on talking about now!
Now, there's nothing quite like the holiday season- especially in Destiny! Every year, the game hosts a series of limited-time events for Guardians that coincide with each of the major holidays! For Valentine's Day we have Crimson Days, for the Easter/spring season, we get Revelry, for the start of summer we get the Guardians Games, and for the end of summer, we get the Solstice of Heroes (to celebrate the anniversary of when the game first came out!) Similarly, we also get the Festival of the Lost for Halloween, and finally the Dawning for the holiday season!
Out of all the events, the Dawning is probably my favorite. Much like the holiday season tends to be my favorite time of year, the holiday celebrations in Destiny are probably my favorite time in the game. It's a time of gift-giving, throwing snowballs, and- wait for it- baking cookies! Now there's a ton of different cookies you can make for your favorite Vanguard members and friends in the game, but I went with Gjallardoodles (lovingly named after a fan favorite rocket launcher- the Gjallarhorn).
Yes, I know we moved right from Halloween to the holiday season- but come on! I start listening to Christmas music on November 1st. I'd have my tree up at the same time too if I didn't get the side eye. Besides, it's a ton of fun to bake cookies- especially for the commander of the Vanguard! So, a gamer girl who knows how to cookie is guided by the Guardians as she attempts to make some delicious Gjallardoodles!
Hopefully these are only explosive in terms of flavor! ;)
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The Gourmet Gamer Girl's Guide to Baking Gjallardoodles
I'm sure you know the drill by now, dear reader. Baking = science, cooking = art. I really hammer those ideas home, don't I? Well, it's another baking week since we're making holiday cookies. I know, I know- it's supposed to be a cooking week since I baked last time. I wanted to do Destiny this week- and the only other option I had was ramen. I happen to be saving ramen for a different game in the future- so I went with Destiny's holiday cookies instead. I'm in the holiday spirit too, so I wanted to make some holiday goods!
Anyways, back to the discussion on art and science. Last time we did a scandalous thing and baked without a recipe. That was fine since we didn't do any actual baking that would have required one (besides the crumble, but baking a crumble is easy. It's really hard to mess that up.. so you don't really need a recipe for that). Since we're baking cookies this time, I'd argue we do need a recipe. In my experience, cookie baking usually involved baking powder so that your cookies cook correctly and don't end up a saggy, under-cooked mess. So yes, we will be following a recipe this time! I want Gjallardoodles that taste good! I'm no scientist, remember? I leave the science-ing to the professionals, dear reader.
Well, much like our Skyrim baking adventures, Destiny has also released an official cookbook: Destiny- The Official Cookbook by Victoria Rosenthal. This cookbook was created with and endorsed by Bungie, and includes a ton of recipes from the game! I followed the recipe for Gjallardoodles that was offered up by the book since I knew it was exactly what I needed!
The Baking Process
Much like the sweet rolls we baked a few weeks back, these were super easy to gather ingredients for. Most of it is your standard cookie baking ingredients- flour, sugar, egg, vanilla, baking powder, et cetera, et cetera. The only thing I had to go shopping for was cashews since I don't usually have them on hand. They are my favorite kind of nut, but I tend not to eat them too often since they can be kind of expensive depending on where you buy them.
So... the baking! We start as always- preheating the oven. I went with 350 degrees since that's what the cookies baked at in the recipe. I also had to cook the cashews that go inside the cookie, but the recipe didn't offer a temperature for this- so I thought 350 would probably do for that too.
I started with parchment paper on a cookie sheet, then put my measured cashews on top of that. Since I didn't need a ton of them, I went with a quarter sheet pan for baking them. I know I said I hate parchment paper, but I don't have silicone mats for quarter sheets- so we work with what we got. I let these bake for about ten minutes before I pulled them out.
Here they are all nice and baked! Once I could smell them and they started to turn a bit shiny, I pulled them out. There's a pretty thin line between nicely cooked nuts and burnt nuts- so I was glad I didn't let them go any longer. I let them cool for a bit while I found my mini food processor. I have a big one I keep in my basement, but I do have a mini one in my kitchen for grinding small quantities of things- just like this!
From here, it was a simple matter of putting the lid on and pressing the "grind" button a few times until they were small little pieces. Then, I just tossed them in a bowl while I worked on getting my other ingredients together!
I dumped the flour, baking powder, and salt with the cashews and then I mixed all that together with a whisk so that everything was evenly distributed. In cookie dialect, this is referred to as your "dry ingredients". I left this off to the side while I began work on my "wet ingredients".
Most "wet ingredients" start with butter. This recipe called for one cup- so two sticks. I went with salted butter since I still had some on hand from the survivor pudding we made last time. There's not a huge difference, so it didn't really matter all too much to me that it was salted instead of unsalted. The butter also needed to be room temperature, so I had to microwave mine a bit so it was soft enough to work with. That's what the fingerprints are from, by the way. I had to make sure it was soft enough to mush up. If your butter isn't soft enough, you'll end up with weird chunks of it in your dough and it won't come together right. I've made that mistake with chocolate chip cookies before- and my dough turned out weird and didn't puff when it baked. Flat cookies suck, man.
From here, we just "cream" the butter. Basically, we mix it with our sugar until they're both incorporated together nicely. It tends to look really whipped and thick like this until you add your other ingredients (usually egg and vanilla!)
Speaking of eggs, this recipe was interesting. Most of the time, cookie recipes call for one or two eggs to help bind. This one called for one egg white- just the white. Yay! We get to separate eggs!
I wanted to take pictures of this, but it's hard to take a picture and separate an egg at the same time. Basically, we just crack the shell in two halves and move the egg from one shell to the other. I did this over my bowl of butter and sugar, so the white dripped into the bowl and the yolk stayed in the shell.
Now, separating to use the white is harder than separating to use the yolk. If the yolk breaks when you separate (and you plan on just needing the yolk) it's no biggie. Just dump what you have into the bowl and roll with it. When it breaks and you need the whites- that's the yikes. See, things like meringue need egg whites because they fluff when whipped. If you have yolk in there- you won't get that. So, when your yolk breaks and gets mixed into your whites- you have to start over and be extra careful. One of the pitfalls of using the shell is it's easy to break the yolk if you aren't careful!
That didn't happen to me this time, but it has before. Real pain in the neck that one! Anyways, my whites fell into the bowl and I transferred the yolk into a tiny dish to cook later for my dogs in their dinner!
From here, I just mixed until it was all incorporated together. Then (as the recipe called for) I added half my dry ingredients to the bowl and mixed that together. I used a hand mixer for all this since my stand mixer is in my basement with my food processor (and I was too lazy too go grab it once again. I also had a perfectly good hand mixer right there!)
Here is the mixture after I added the other half of the flour, and then once all that was mixed together. Notice the bowl change? Yeah, my original bowl was too small so I had to swap. A mistake I make all too often when baking- but, you live and you learn! The texture was a bit crumbly, but it seemed similar to chocolate chip cookie dough (or at leas the kind I usually make), so I rolled with it.
Now, this recipe calls for the dough to go in the freezer. I've done this before with cookies, and it usually help the cookies not spread as much (since the butter is cold, instead of room temperature). Really good for making nice, puffy cookies! Unfortunately, I didn't pay close enough attention to the recipe and ended up rolling it before I put it in the freezer (a step not in the original recipe). That was a poor idea on my part, because when I took it out of the freezer it all fell apart and then I had to do it all over again! Work smarter- not harder, dear reader. And always read the recipe closely so you don't have to do double the work! There's the dough in my freezer. I chilled it for ten minutes before I took it out for rolling!
Here's my dough after re-rolling it back out. The recipe called for a floured countertop, but I didn't want the mess. I went with rolling our on a silicone rolling mat to prevent extra clean up and avoid sticking to the table. These are also super good for rolling out pie crust, by the way! Mine has a grid for measuring! :)
The recipe called for a two inch cookie cutter, but I only had a two and a quarter inch cutter, so I went with that. It's the one I usually use for making Kolackies (a delicious Eastern European cookie made with jelly and powdered sugar. It's kind of like a sugar cookie, but I digress- we're here for Gjallardoodles!) It's a nice size for a cookie that isn't too big or too small. They were pretty easy to remove, but some of them were a bit too thin (mostly the ones near that top edge), so I ended up having to re-roll some of them into my leftover dough. Oh well!
Here's the first group I rolled out. They aren't entirely perfect, but sometimes cookies aren't! As long as they all happen to be around the same(ish) thickness, they'll all cook at the same time- which is good enough for me! After I cut out all my little circles, I just rolled my dough scraps into a new ball and re-rolled that back out again to the same thickness. The process repeated until I was out of dough!
I ended up with enough dough to fill another half sheet pan, so I just pulled one out and put my extras on top of it! The dough wasn't too bad to roll out, but some of them were a bit crumbly and hard to pry out. Maybe I didn't let the dough sit long enough. I'll try a bit longer next time.
After this, I just pressed an extra cashew into the center (like the picture from the recipe!) After that, I just popped them into the oven and let them cook for about 15 minutes- which is when the bottoms were nice and golden brown.
Here they are out of the oven! They probably don't look all too different- but much like the Kolackies I make for Christmas every year, the tops of these didn't brown all too much. It didn't bother me all too much! I just let them cool for a few minutes before I pulled them off the cookie sheets and set them on a plate to finish cooling.
Now the real test begins: how did they taste? Worthy of the commander of the Vanguard? Stick around to find out!!
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The Gourmet Gamer Girl Verdict
So... how were they? Were they a delicious holiday extravaganza? Was the flavor as explosive as the rocket launcher they were named after? Are they a new favorite? Will I be making more holiday treats from the Destiny universe? Lots of questions, and a lot of answers to be had! Shall we dive in?
As always, we start with the level of cooking easiness. On a scale? These were about a two or three on how difficult they were to make. Like most cookies, the dough was super easy to whip up. The real issue was the rolling for me. Some of them broke, and I feel like the dough may have been a bit too crumbly. It was a bit of a struggle to actually form them, but I wouldn't call it hard, per say. It was more just a tad bit on the annoying side, than anything.
Anywho... The flavor is what matters, right? These were delightful! They reminded me of almond cookies (something my dad and I are both a huge fan of when we go out for Chinese food!) I was told they were also reminscent of Danish butter cookies and almond crescent cookies by fellow taste testers. A nice, nutty cookie with a bit of a crunch. Delicious!
I would give these a solid 9.5/10! Delicious and super easy to make. I will definitely be making them again! I think next time I may try either adding two egg whites or leaving the egg whole, though. I think batter that is a little bit more wet (or has a bit more fat) may be a tad less crumbly when it comes to rolling.
I also definitely want to try some of the other cookie recipes from the cookbook too! There are a ton of delicious baked goods that I hand out (in-game, at least) every year! Plus, holiday baking is fun. You just have to put on some good ol' Christmas music and some fuzzy socks and have a grand time!
Alas, one thing is very clear: these are definitely worthy of the commander of the Vanguard, that's for sure. Be proud of me, Zavala. I'll bring you more in a few weeks! After I finish looting my pirate treasure from Eramis, of course!
If you happen to have an interest in baking some delicious holiday cookies made for a cast of colorful alien characters, you can pick up Destiny- The Official Cookbook by Victoria Rosenthal right here! :)
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