holiday dessert wishlist item #3: the parade of peppermint and chocolate marches on

Did you know I have folders full of pages pulled from Martha Stewart Living, tasteful crafts I will never do and recipes I will never make? Does this confirm your suspicion that I'm a hoarder? Because I think of myself as an archivist. An archivist with a sore, throbbing finger from holding a pen while proofreading: 11 hours today, 9 yesterday, 10.5 on Saturday ... shall I go on? Frankly, I'm not sure I have the strength.


Perhaps one of these Chocolate-Peppermint Cookies, from the December 2008 issue of MS Living, would revive me. Or perhaps not. On the one hand, I don't really like white chocolate; on the other, they're so pretty! And they feature what is apparently one of my very favorite flavor combinations (right up there with chocolate and peanut butter, two great tastes that taste great together).

But this is a dessert wishlist, so I don't have to be practical (see four-layer collapsing cake, below) or worry that I don't like one of the main ingredients. I'm never going to make these cookies—they look nearly impossible, and I can barely type with this gimpy finger, let alone make cookie dough, roll it out, cut it, bake it, melt the chocolate, dip the cookies in the chocolate, and sprinkle the whole mess with candy bits.

My only hope is that they will appear on my countertop like Jesus was born to Mary in the manger, a sort of virgin baking event wherein I sit chastely in my kitchen doing nothing but end up with a plate of cookies. A real Christmas miracle.

holiday dessert wishlist item #1: cakes that have appeared on the cover of the december issue of bon appétit

Like most agnostic half-Jews, the yachtsman loves Christmas. Like most recovering Catholics whose parents are divorced, I don't. But being married to a man who takes such great pleasure out of listening to Handel's Messiah and shopping for his nieces and opening presents on Christmas morning (and one year getting a little drunk on Christmas Eve, putting a Band-Aid on his face, and insisting that I call him Nelly) has brought me around from relying on Valium to make it through the day to almost sort of liking it. And it certainly doesn't hurt that that husband of mine can bake.

So weeks ago I told the yachtsman that I'm pretty sure all Jesus wants for His birthday is this cake:

Doesn't this look amazing? It's called professional photography; please don't grow accustomed to it.

That beauty is the Peppermint Meringue Cake With Chocolate Buttercream that was pictured on the cover of December's Bon Appétit. Sadly, however, it's not getting very good reviews on epicurious.com, which will never do. The cake is for the Lord, for God's sake, and He deserves a dessert that received more than a three-fork rating.

Now I'm hoping to convince the yachtsman to once again attempt this glorious cathedral of chocolate, the Devil's Food Cake With Peppermint Frosting that was on the cover of last year's December issue of Bon Appétit.

Also taken by someone who knows what they're doing and owns a real camera.

The yachtsman tried to make this cake for Thanksgiving in 2008, only to have it collapse under its own weight (something I may be doing soon, as well). We ate it anyway, of course, and it was delicious: Chocolatey and minty with marshmallowy icing and what was essentially whipped cream between the layers. Perfect for the Lord Jesus Christ Our Savior who art in heaven, hallowed be His name, right? And because the only Jesus I would ever believe in is kind and forgiving and loves and accepts all of his children no matter what (this is sadly not the same Jesus I was introduced to at the Cathedral of Immaculate Conception), He would not care at all if His cake collapsed or that it was made by an agnostic half-Jew. He would not even care if I ate most of it, because as it says in the bible, It is better to giveth than to receiveth, to which I say, Thank you, Jesus.