Eventually you will get the call. A situation will arise wherein you must have a good stand mixer, so you might as well be prepared. Let this recipe be the push that makes you buy the mixer of your heart’s desire. I’m partial to my KitchenAid Professional 5 Plus model, but I must confess, I’ve occasionally cast a greedy eye on the red, metallic Viking at my neighborhood kitchen store.
Once you have a reliable mixer, this butter mint dough is perfect for you and your new appliance to get to know one another. If you are already in a committed relationship with a mixer, this recipe can serve as a long over do date night. I mean it, at the end of a long week, you can’t beat a hot toddy, a fine working machine and smooth pliable dough.
The ingredients are basic, but the dough, she is fussy. However, if treated right, this dough comes alive with the same living quality yeasted doughs possess. I’m not sure how, but it really does, and you don’t have heat up your kitchen baking. It’s basically butter and sugar and yet the dough is neither sticky nor greasy. It’s soft and smooth and almost elastic.
Perfect Party Butter Mints
This makes a big batch, but they keep for months.
2 lbs powdered sugar
½ cup (one stick) soft butter
2 teaspoons peppermint extract
⅔ cups light corn syrup
Few drops food color
Put all the ingredients in your mixer. Beat on low speed, with the dough hook for 5 min. Slowly add a few drops of food color.
Perfect party butter mints must be pastel!
Scrape down the sides and continue mixing until smooth. Take the dough out and knead until even smoother. Pinch off a golf ball sized handful, and cover the remaining dough with an undeniably darling embroidered tea towel. Roll your small piece of dough into a rope that is approximately the diameter of your little finger, cut into ½ to ¼ inch pieces and let dry on a wax paper lined sheets for at least four or five days before bagging. They will keep uncovered in a candy dish forever. (But they’ll be eaten in no time.) This entire process requires you to slow down. Take the time to connect with your mixer and the dough. Make the mints a meditation. At first you will think the dough is too dry, walk away, unload the dishwasher and come back. The dough should be slapping off the sides of the mixer and turning a very pale pastel. If it hasn’t started to do this, scrape down the sides and walk away again. Slow down and enjoy the rolling out as well. Be aware of your posture and breathing. If you can’t slow down, wrap the dough tightly in plastic, do not refrigerate and roll them out tomorrow. There is zero doubt. You can taste love when you cook with this dough. The recipient of your mints will shift into the peaceful mint making mediation as soon as these sweet little pillows melt in their mouths.