Cook Share and Feast

A couple of times I tried to make cookies in the past, but with no luck.  So I thought of trying this cookie out today.  The cookies came out pretty good.  But I still haven’t mastered the art of rolling the dough on a floured board.  I had to put so much flour to make sure it does not stick to the board.  But at the end, I was very happy to see these cookies nicely baked.

Ingredients

• 5 oz ground almond/almond meal
• 6 oz all-purpose flour
• 5 oz butter at room temperature
• 3 oz castor sugar (increase the amount if you like the cookie to be sweet, I don’t like too much sugar)
• Grated rind of 1 lemon
• ½ teaspoon lemon extract
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 egg white
• Crushed/flaked almond
• About 1 cup raspberry jam
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Method

• Cream butter and sugar until soft and fluffy
• Stir in the lemon grind, lemon extract, and vanilla
• Add ground almond and flour and mix well
• Make the dough into a ball and wrap in a plastic wrap and chill for about 1 hour.
• Preheat oven to 325F
• Line 2 cookie sheet with parchment paper and butter them a little bit
• Divide the cookie dough into 4 equal parts working with one section at a time
• Roll out the dough to a thickness of about 3 mm on a floured board and
• With a cookie cutter stamp out circles
• Using a small cutter or a piping nozzle stamp small inner circles

• Whisk egg white until lightly frosty
• Brush cookies with egg whites and sprinkle with crushed almonds
• Bake until lightly browned – about 15 minutes
• To make the jam filling: in a saucepan heat jam and lemon juice until it comes to a simmer
• Spread jam over the cookies and sandwich them together

Note: if you don’t have ground almond, you can use blanched almonds.  Grind them into a coarse powder.  Also when I make cookies or cake, I prefer salted butter.  In this way I don’t need to add extra salt to cookies or cakes.

I found this recipe in good housekeeping website (http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/recipefinder/healthy-makeover-brownies-recipe?click=recipe_sr)

I took this recipe and modified a little bit.  I don’t like strong cocoa taste or too much sugar.  So I reduced the amount of sugar a little bit and replaced ¼ cup of cocoa powder with all-purpose flour.  The brownies came out quite good.  But I had to keep them in an air tight container.  When I left them outside for a while, they became a little dry.

Here is how the brownie looks when cut:

Ingredients

• 1 teaspoon instant coffee granules
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• ¾ cup all-purpose flour
• ¼ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• ¼ teaspoon baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• ¾ cup sugar
• ¼ cup vegetable oil spread or cooking oil
• 3 large egg whites
• About 10 walnuts chopped (optional)
• Butter of greasing baking pan

Method

• Preheat oven to 350F.
• Butter a square (8 x 8 inch) baking pan
• Add vanilla extract to coffee powder/granules and let it dissolve
• Sift flour and combine cocoa powder, flour, salt, and baking powder
• In a medium bowl whisk together oil, egg whites, sugar and coffee mixture until well mixed and smooth
• Blend in flour mixture and walnuts and mix well
• Spread in the prepared pan and bake for about 25 – 30 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean

• Cool pan for about 2 hours
• When cool cut brownies into squares
• Sprinkle with powdered sugar

• Makes about 16 brownies

Ingredients

• 4  oz walnuts
• 5 oz all-purpose flour
• 2 table spoons fine castor sugar
• 4 oz / 1 stick butter
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• Powdered sugar / icing sugar

Method

• Pre-heat oven to 300 F.
• Butter a cookie sheet generously

• In a mixing bowl beat butter and sugar until soft and fluffy
• Add vanilla and beat well
• Sift  the flour
• Grind the walnuts in a food processor until it becomes a coarse powder.  Stir the nuts several times when grinding to prevent becoming oily
• Stir ground nuts and flour into the butter mixture
• Make small marble sized balls with the mixture using palm of your hands
• Place these in a prepared cookie sheet and bake for about 45 minutes
• Let cool the cookies for about 10 – 15 minutes
• While they are still warm, roll in powdered sugar
• Let cool completely and roll again in powdered sugar
• Makes about 30 cookies