HAPPY ST. VALENTINE'S DAY

Shakespeare might think that music is the food of love, but I must be very pedestrian because my motto is "If food be the food of love, eat on"!!!!!

I associate chocolate and Champagne with romance - probably because I love both, and any excuse!!  This year I wanted to make a nod to the day that's in it - despite my ongoing efforts to shed a few pounds.  To this end I searched out Ellie Krieger's book The Food You Crave - Luscious Recipes for a Healthy Life (I bought it late last year and then forgot all about it - anyone else ever do that?!).  She had a lovely sounding recipe for Triple Chocolate Cookies and I thought that they would do the trick - we'd get the chocolate hit and my poor hips wouldn't become an increasing target!!

They are delicious - darkly chocolaty with an interesting (in a good way) texture, which is helped rather than hindered by the whole wheat flour.  My only problem was that Ellie said that the recipe made 24 cookies - I could only etch out 14!!  I know that I am probably failing on the "portion size" module of my diet education - but dividing the mixture into 24  would have made TINY cookies, anyway these morsels are not quite as low in calories as I might wish (!) but they have it all taste wise.  I have (of course) played around with the recipe, and this is how I made them:



Triple Chocolate Cookies

1/2 stick (2oz)        butter, softened
1/2 cup                   packed brown sugar
1/4 cup                   flavourless oil (I used sunflower)
1 large                    egg
1 tsp                      vanilla extract
1/2 cup                  whole wheat flour
1/4 cup                  cocoa powder
1 oz                       dark chocolate (about 70%) - chopped*
1 oz                       milk chocolate - chopped*


Preheat oven to 180 C/350 F
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper

Mash the butter and sugars together until well combined.
Add the oil and the egg and beat until creamy.
Add the vanilla and combine.
Sift the flour and cocoa into the butter mixture (just add in any flour that doesn't go through the sieve)
Mix until fully combined.
Add the chocolate and mix well.
Place teaspoons of the mixture on the baking sheet, leaving space between the cookies. (I made mine in two batches)
Bake until they are set - about 12 minutes.
Cool on a wire rack.
When cool, hide away in a tin - they are way too tempting to leave sitting around!

* I just used 2oz dark chocolate (which actually only makes these Double Choc - oops!!)

Enjoy.

COOKIE COMFORT

Can you believe that I took this photo yesterday ....  in Ireland ...... in March!!!!!  We have been having the most unbelievable weather recently,  last week was all bright sun (although cold) then we had (almost) torrential rain on Monday, then SNOW yesterday.

Of course my thoughts turned to food the minute I looked out the window!!  Comfort food was what the doctor ordered, so I turned to Nigella.com and to the members own recipes.  There are two recipes that stand out on the cookie front:  CAL's oat cookies, and Jon's peanut butter cookies.  They have one thing in common,  they are so much more than the sum of their parts.  Both have few ingredients,  but taste truly wonderful.  If I had to choose one to go for it would be the oat cookies (sorry Jon!!) and that's a textural thing, I love that crumbly, crunchy feeling.

These are both real "store cupboard" standbys.  The oat ones particularly handy as they don't contain any egg (the ingredient I am most likely to run out of),  and they taste great.  What more could you ask for??

Here goes:

CAL's Oat So Simple Cookies

Preheat oven to 180 C
Line baking trays

100g   Oats
100g   Plain Flour
100g   Caster Sugar (see a pattern here??)
100g   Butter
1 tbsp Honey/Golden Syrup
1 tsp   Cinnamon/Mixed Spice

Makes about 15 cookies

Mix oats, flour and spice.
Melt the butter, sugar and syrup in a saucepan.
Combine the flour and butter mixtures.
Use two spoons to form into balls and place on the lined baking sheets.
Dampen the spoon and press down on the cookies.
Bake for 15 - 20 minutes, or until golden brown.
Remove from the oven and allow to rest for 5 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.

It is simple to make large batches of these little beauties, as the proportions increase easily.


Jon's Peanut Butter Cookies

Preheat oven to 175 C
Line a baking tray

1 cup      peanut butter (I used crunchy)*
1/2 cup   sugar**
1             egg

Beat the egg until frothy.
Add the peanut butter and stir with a wooden spoon until smoothish.
Add sugar and stir until smooth
Roll walnut sized portions between your hands.
Place on baking tray and press down with a fork.
Bake for 10 minutes (approx)
When baked remove tray from oven and leave for 5 minutes, then transfer cookies to a cooling rack.

*Use good quality peanut butter.
** Original recipe called for 1 cup of sugar but I found this too much.


Enjoy.

MY BISCUIT IS PIMPED!

Over at the wonderful "Claytons Blog" http://vipantrywedonthaveablog.blogspot.com/, EmmCee has challenged us to "Pimp" a Biscuit, and this is my effort.

I have spent hours in the biscuit isle of the local supermarkets - not my usual lurking section (that's more the baking isle) - eyeing up my options.  I had originally wanted to try a particularly Irish biscuit, but the only one I could think of was a Mikado, and I really don't like them, so I've resorted to the good old Custard Cream.

My first disappointment was that the custard creams were rectangle, not the round shape I had remembered from my biscuit buying past.  I have two sandwich tins the exact size stipulated in the rules,  but I reckon that I needed to stick as near to the original as possible (only better! - I hope!!)

I started with a shortbread base, I really love this shortbread, it's wonderful crumbly texture is due to the rice flour, it is alot lighter than other shortbreads I've tried with a pleasant grainy feeling in the mouth.

I made the filling with Birds custard - it was exactly the flavor I was after, it had the custardiness of a custard cream but didn't have the synthetic taste I was afraid I'd get. Result!!!!

The biscuit shape was my next problem,  I decided to use my large brownie tin, which is about 16 1/2inches x 7 1/2 inches, and cut the shortbread in half when it came out of the oven.  I think it worked well.

Here's the recipe:

Shortbread

170g   softened butter
85g     caster sugar
170g   plain flour
85g     rice flour

Line and butter your tin (I usually use 2 x 8" round sandwich tins)
Preheat oven to 150 C

Mix butter and sugar, until fluffy.

Sift flours and add gradually to the butter mixture.

This can be quite crumbly (see picture) but comes together well when you knead lightly.
Divide mixture between the tins and press down as evenly as possible.
Pop into the fridge for at least 30 minutes (can be done the day before if that helps)
Bake at 150 C for 30 - 40 minutes, until a light golden colour.
Allow to cool for 10 minutes in the tin, then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

This shortbread is wonderful served with fresh berries and cream,  but that's beside the point I'm making a custard cream, this was the filling.

Custard Icing

100g     icing sugar
50g       soft butter
1 tbsp   custard powder

Whip the butter in a mixer, gradually add the sugar and custard powder.  If necessary add a tablespoon or two of hot water to get the desired texture.

I piped the custard icing onto the bottom sheet of shorbread and sandwich with the other sheet.

The "biscuit" passed the taste test here (ie. disappeared in no time) the shortbread was crunchy and crumbly, and the "custard" contrasted wonderfully, much smoother then the real thing.  The biscuit pimping exercise would have to be called a success!!! I want to say thank you to EmmCee, for bringing us this challenge - it's been great fun.

Enjoy!

COOKIES WITH A STORY

I have come across the Neiman Marcus Cookie story a few times, whereby a lady at the Neiman Marcus Cafe asked for the recipe for the cookies she had just eaten, the waitress explained that there would be a "two fifty" charge, the lady presumed that this covered the photo-copying and said that that was fine.  When she got home she realized that they had charged her two hundred and fifty dollars for the recipe - so she e-mailed it to everyone she knew (requesting them to forward it to all their contacts) so nobody else would be stung like that!!!!!

With a back story like that I just had to try the recipe myself, and a very good recipe it is too..... not $250 good but very, very good.  The blitzed oats give the cookies a wonderful texture.

I got my recipe from http://www.browneyedbaker.com/, a really enjoyable blog, with fantastic photos.  I have used the american measurements, except for the butter which I have converted (I find measuring butter by cups far too messy!).  I give you the recipe as I made it, with a couple of tiny tweaks.


The Neiman Marcus Cookie

Makes about 25 cookies

2 1/2    cups of rolled oats
2          cups plain flour
1 tsp     baking powder
1 tsp     bicarbonate of soda (bread soda)
1cup/230g  butter
1 cup    granulated sugar
1 cup    brown sugar
2           eggs
1 tsp     vanilla extract
12oz     milk chocolate chips
4  oz     dark chocolate chips
1/2       cup hazelnuts


Preheat oven to 180 C,  Line baking sheets with parchment paper.

Blend the oats in a food processor to a fine powder. 
Using a medium to large bowl, combine the blended oats, flour, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda (bread soda), and set aside.
In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream together the butter and both sugars until light and fluffy, (3-4 minutes).
Scrape down the sides of the bowl and beat in the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. 
Beat in the vanilla extract.
On a low speed gradually mix in the flour mixture until just incorporated.
Fold in the chocolate chips and nuts.
Divide the dough into 2 oz balls ( about 2 tbsp worth) and place about 3 inches apart on the baking sheets.*
Bake in the preheated oven for 10 minutes.
The cookies should be lightly brown and set in the outside but still look a little undone in the middle - that's OK they will finish setting up after they are removed from the oven.
Allow to cool for 5 minutes on the baking sheet and then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.

*At this stage I put half my raw cookies on a tray in the freezer, and after a couple of hours bagged them up.
They are the best thing ever to have in the freezer as they can be baked for 15 minutes from frozen when unexpected guests arrive - really impressive stuff!!!!

*An ice-cream scoop is great for measuring out the dough for large cookies.


Enjoy.

Happy Mother's Day To You  All  :-}

TO BOLDLY GO!

To Boldly Go where so many talented and entertaining bloggers have gone before, I don't know if I have anything to add to the world of food blogs. I do know that I am passionate about cooking and baking and enjoying the outcome with my family and friends. I hope that I can make a small contribution to the world of food blogs with which I am becoming slightly obsessed!!

I know that Brownieville Girl should start her blog with a Brownie recipe (and I have many up my sleeve!) but I am nothing if not awkward (!) so I am blogging about my current favourite cookies (for this week anyway!).

The recipe is based on Nigella Lawson's Cranberry and White Chocolate Cookies with a few tweaks along the way.

WHITE CHOCOLATE AND CRANBERRY COOKIES

125g soft butter

175g soft light brown sugar

1 egg

150g plain flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

75g porridge (oats)

75g dried cranberries

150g white chocolate (chopped) - I thing Green and Black is best

Zest of one orange

Preheat oven to 180 C.

Line 2 baking sheets with baking parchment.

Beat butter and sugar together until creamy (best with electric mixer) then add the egg and orange zest while the mixer is going.

Beat in the flour, baking powder and porridge oats, and fold in the cranberries and chopped chocolate.

Roll tablespoons of dough into balls with your hands and place on baking sheet (with room to spread) and flatten with a fork.

Place in oven and check at 15 minutes, I usually swap baking sheets round at this stage, but they could be done (depending on your oven). Remove from the oven when the cookies are pale gold. Leave to continue to cook on the baking sheet on your cooling rack for 5 to 10 minutes. Then remove (I use my fish slice) to cool completely on the wire rack.

Hide the cookies when cool or the will disappear in no time!!!!