Speculaas

Today marks the 15th recipe Club: Baked has made from Baked Explorations.  Last July we started on a journey to bake our way through all the recipes in this cookbook.  This week is a little different because we are teaming up with the Baked Sunday Mornings group since our schedules matched up for this week's pick, Speculaas. 

I was excited to see Speculaas on the baking roster because I'm a big fan of sugar and spice and everything nice and that's what I envisioned for these crunchy spice cookies.  I have made a similar spice cookie, Speculoos, the French cousin of the Dutch Speculaas, in the past and really enjoyed them, leaving me with high hopes for their Dutch counterpart.

I'm just going to rip the bandaid off and say it. I didn't care for the Speculaas.  The spice combination just didn't work for me.  Though I'm not quite sure why.  I like all the components but somehow the overall balance of spices was off.  I will say that I didn't use fresh grated nutmeg, so perhaps that had something to do with it.  These cookies also baked up darker than I prefer.  In the Baked Explorations book the authors allude to Speculaas being like the biscoff cookies that Delta Airlines serves as a snack to its passengers.  I have had Delta's cookies, they are delicious and completely addicting.  I'm sure it won't surprise you to hear that I don't think the Speculaas live up to the famous airline cookie. 

I'm definitely in the minority here because it seems my fellow bakers had a lot of success with their cookies. You can see how everyone's cookies turned out by clicking here.  For the recipe head over to Baked Sunday Mornings.

I've made 12 of the 15 Club: Baked recipes and this is the first one that I really didn't care for.  Not too bad on the odds overall.

Next up on the baking schedule--Soft Candy Caramels.