Melon-Pan

I discovered melon-pan (literally melon bread) when I was in university after the Hubby introduced me to an anime called Yakitate! Japan.  It's all about bread and I loved it.  I'm a bit of an obsessive when it comes to Japanese culture and food is something that fascinates me.  (I really want to try some more Japanese sweet baking at some point).  Melon-pan is something that has popped up a number of times but until Yakitate! I didn't really understand what it was.  Put simply, it is a bread roll encased in a layer of sweet cookie dough.  The 'melon' part actually comes from the way it looks rather than tasting like melons.  That said, it is possible to get melon flavoured melon-pan.

Going back to this made me marvel at how much the Internet has changed in just a few years.  Once I finally knew what melon-pan was, I was determined to try it!  I scoured the Internet for a recipe that was in English (or could be translated reasonably well) and eventually found one.  The result was interesting.  Quite complicated and I distinctly remember the cookie dough being runny.  You dipped the bread in it.  It was weird (and also made it hard to get the melon pattern).  I don't think the bread cooked brilliantly but they were okay and the combination of the bread and the cookie dough is quite delicious.  Fast forward to now, when I was struck with nostalgia for melon-pan.  I no longer had my original recipe so had to find a new one.  My goodness there were loads!  No trawling like the first time.  The one I ended up going for is from Mari Nameshida's blog.  I have her cookbook and I like her stuff.  This recipe was really simple, though I made a couple of changes since I don't have dried milk powder.

The final result was lovely.  Not too sweet and the two parts went together nicely.  The bread was actually properly cooked, as was the cookie dough.  I wish I had been able to slice the top properly.  My pattern isn't very noticeable.  I also probably could have done with keeping them in the oven a little longer so the colour was a bit darker on top.  Ah well.  Will be making these again as the Hubby ate most of them before I had a chance.

Recipe - adapted from Mari's Tokyo Kitchen
Makes 4



Bread: 

• 70ml/fl.oz scalded milk, allowed to cool so it is just warm
• 1 tsp instant yeast
• 2 tbsp caster sugar
• 150g/oz strong white flour
• 1/2 large egg
• 30g/1oz butter
• Pinch of salt

Cookie dough:

• 100g/3.5oz plain flour
• 30g/1oz butter
• 2 tbsp caster sugar
• 1/2 large egg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Start with the bread dough.  Combine the scalded milk, instant yeast and sugar together in a cup and allow to sit for 10 minutes.
2. In a large bowl mix together the flour, egg and yeasted milk until combined.  (Make sure you get all the sugar out the milk cup).
3. Add the butter and salt and mix until it forms a sticky dough.
4. Turn the dough out onto a plate.  Stretch the dough away from yourself and then fold over on itself.  Give the plate a quarter turn and repeat.  Keep doing this for about 10 minutes until the dough becomes smooth and less sticky.
5. Shape into a smooth ball, cover with with clingfilm and allow to rise until doubled in size (about 30 minutes in a warm place).
6. Meanwhile make the cookie dough.  Cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl until it is smooth and pale.
7. Add the egg and vanilla extract and mix to combine.
8. Fold in the flour until the mixture comes together to form a dough.
9. Shape the dough into a cylinder and wrap in clingfilm.  Place in the fridge to chill for at least 30 minutes.
10. Once the bread dough has risen, take it out and give another knead in the same manner as before to knock the air out.  
11. Divide the dough into four pieces and roll each into a ball.  Cover with a tea towel and allow to rise for about 20 minutes (until noticeably bigger).
12. Cover a tray with greaseproof paper.
13. When dough has risen once more, remove the cookie dough from the fridge and divide into four.
14. Place a piece between two pieces of clingfilm and roll out into a thin round.  Place one of the bread rolls in the middle of the cookie dough, upside down, and then wrap the cookie dough around the bread.  Place right side up on the prepared tray.  Repeat for the other 3 rolls.
15. Use a sharp knife or dough slicer to draw a cross-hatch slit pattern in the top of the cookie dough and sprinkle each roll with sugar.
16. Cover with a tea towel and allow to rest for about 20 minutes.  Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 180ĔC/375°F/Gas Mark 4.
17. Bake the rolls for 10 minutes then turn the oven temperature down to 160°C/325°F/Gas Mark 2 and bake for another 15 minutes or so.
18. Allow to cool on a wire rack before eating.

White Chocolate and Cranberry Matcha Tea Trees for The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap

Despite the lack of activity this year I knew I wasn't going to miss out on the Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap.  I had so much fun doing it last year that as soon as applications opened, I signed up. The fact it is for charity is just a bonus really.

"The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap brings together food bloggers from around the world in celebration of all things scrumptious. The premise is this: sign up. Receive the addresses of three other food bloggers. Send each of them one dozen delicious homemade cookies. Receive three different boxes of scrumptious cookies from other bloggers. Eat them all yourself (or, you know, share. If you want. No judgement either way.) Post your cookie recipe on your blog. See everyone else’s cookie recipes. Salivate. Get lots of great ideas for next year’s cookie swap. Rinse and repeat.

This year we are again excited to be partnering with Cookies for Kids’ Cancer, a national non-profit organization committed to funding new therapies used in the fight against paediatric cancer, which claims the lives of more children in the US than any other disease. By participating in this cookie swap you are not only contributing to the food blogger community, but also supporting a great cause."

If you are interested in taking part next year you can sign up to be notified when next year's cookie swap opens.

Now (some of) you know me: I like to get inventive for this.  I also like to get festive.  Hence why last year was a take on a classic Christmas flavour (gingerbread) mixed with a little extra of what reminded me of the start of the season (cola).  This year was going to be no different.  I wanted something different from the usual chocolate chip, shortbread or gingerbread (not that I would complain if I received any of those myself).  I cannot remember what got me on to looking at matcha tea as an ingredient but once I had it I wondered about adding more Christmassy ingredients to it, namely cranberries and white chocolate (a popular combination with the Hubby).  And since matcha is green, I thought it would be so cute to make them look like Christmas trees!

The main research for this went into finding a recipe that used matcha and produced a cookie that would hold it's shape by baking.  Of course, I started early in case this bizarre idea turned out to be a disaster.  I required the Hubby's approval and was really unsure if I would get it with these.  Matcha is a bit out there.  I made up a small batch of the recipe I found and conveniently it made exactly one dozen cookies.  I used the tree cutter I had at the time but ended up buying a new one specially for the final ones because the shape looked too much like a holly leaf.  I tentatively offered one to the Hubby, saying I wouldn't be offended if he didn't like it.  As you've probably guessed though, he did like it.  In fact, he loved it and scoffed my whole batch!

I needed to be prompt with getting my cookies done and sent.  December is a busy time at school, even if I'm only working part-time.  I had to prepare my dough on a Sunday, cut and bake 3 dozen on the Monday after I got in from work and then finally photograph and package them on Tuesday, ready for the Hubby to take to the Post Office on Wednesday.  I really had to be strict with myself.  There were several moments where I wanted to just curl up on the couch and sleep.  I also annoyed my cats by shutting them in the hall so I could do my photography.  It is a bit of a problem living in a small flat with two nosy kittens who want to climb on your equipment.  Even more so when there are pretty ribbons all over the place!

Worth it though! I loved how my cookies turned out and I'm really hoping Claire (Clairey Fairy's Cooking), Alicia (Beef and Brioche) and Laura (Foodie Laura) enjoyed them!

I know I have been enjoying what arrived for me not long after: 

Soft Ricotta Cookies with Almond Icing from Iris at Whatever Gets You Through The Day	Chocolate and Candycane Cookies from Karen at Yankee Doodle Paddy	Mint Chocolate Snowball Cookies from Marsha of Marsha's Baking Addiction

The Hubby and I have been steadily scoffing our way through all these delicious bakes from three lovely ladies.  We also took some to share when we went to dinner at the in-laws and they very much appreciated it.  The Hubby says the cookie swap makes this the best time of year!

Recipe - adapted from Just One Cookbook

Makes 36 cookies

• 360g/12.5oz plain flour
• 22.5g/0.8oz matcha tea powder (green tea powder)
• 225g/8oz unsalted butter
• 195g/7oz icing sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 3 egg yolks
• 150g/5.5oz white chocolate chips
• 100g/3.5oz dried cranberries

1. Sift the plain flour and matcha into a bowl.
2. Cream the butter, icing sugar and salt together until pale and fluffy.
3. Add the egg yolks and beat in well.
4. Add the flour and matcha mix gradually to the butter.  Beat mixture until a soft dough forms.
5. Fold in the chocolate chips and cranberries.
6. Shape the dough into 3 equal rounds and wrap in clingfilm.  Chill in the fridge overnight.
7. Line a few baking trays with baking parchment.
8. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to a thickness of 7mm/0.25inches and cut into Christmas tree shapes using a cutter.  Place the cookies on the tray.
9. Put the cookies in the fridge while you preheat the oven to 150C/300F/Gas Mark 2.
10. Bake for about 20-25 minutes.  Allow them to rest on the tray for a couple of minutes after removing from the oven before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Cola Gingerbread Men for the Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap

My oh my, baking has been even more lacking.  Work is hard and distressing right now and not looking to get better any time soon, hence the sheer amount of not posting there has been.  Sorry.  But you don't want to hear about that, you're here for cookies!  Specifically, for cookie swap cookies!

I stumbled across the Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap last year, after it had closed.  I was really disappointed as it looked like such fun!  So of course I immediately added myself to the mailing list so I would not miss out next time.

It wasn't until mid October that I began to wonder about whether or not the swap had opened up again.  I hadn't received any email saying so.  Some investigation revealed that yes, it had opened up, and that my email had ended up in the Junk folder.  A good thing I checked or I'd be sitting out this year too!  So I got signed up and then began plotting.

The idea for the cookies came from a book I was reading.  In the story one of the characters is a chocolatier but at one point it mentioned cola gingerbread.  Well, I was intrigued.  What an interesting idea and rather ideal for a festive gift.  Gingerbread is very Christmassy, as far as I'm concerned.  The cola is an added bonus as I have always felt that the Coca-Cola advert with the trucks and the song and the lights is the first sign that it is almost Christmas!  I don't care about what's on sale as soon as Hallowe'en finishes, it's not the festive season until Coca-Cola announces that the holidays are coming!

Anyway, I ended up having to experiment with this recipe for a couple of weeks as there was not an existing recipe for cola gingerbread cookies (that I could find).  So I was having to tamper with an existing recipe.  For my initial batches the shape held up but they caught very easily and the cola flavour was rather too subtle.  So I had to increase the amount of syrup to improve the flavour.  Unfortunately that meant the cookies spread.  Not such a big deal really, except that it meant I couldn't do my original idea for the final look.  Based on something I had seen on Pinterest, I wanted to have my gingerbread men hugging their cola bottles.  This was also part of the experimentation.  It worked well in the early batches but wouldn't in the later ones.  Flavour trumps aesthetics though for me so I just went with the spreading batches and used icing to attach the cola bottles to my little men.  Not quite as lovely but still rather cute.  The only other problem this caused was that packaging the little guys was a bit of a curfuffle as some of the bottles would come away from the hands.  I managed it in the end though and it seems they arrived fairly intact at their various destinations! 

And once my own cookies were away, the ones from the lovely bloggers who got me in the swap started arriving!  It was kinda fun to get mystery boxes of cookies.  I didn't eat any until the weekend though since the Hubby and I decided to pack them all up and take them to Glasgow with us as we were away for a shopping weekend.  You can see them in all their delicious glory in the pictures below.  From top to bottom: Cranberry, White Chocolate and Sea Salt cookies from Ellie of RovingLights; Malted Chocolate Chip Cookies from Kirsty of Ever So Sweet; and Oat and Maple Syrup Biscotti from Tina of The Worktop.  Thank you so much, ladies.  These were scrumptious and the Hubby and I thoroughly enjoyed them!

I am hoping my swapees liked their cookies just as much.  I can tell you that we certainly enjoyed eating the spares.  I'm not much of a fan of gingerbread and even I was scoffing them without thinking.  They're a slightly soft cookie which are not too hot.  The ginger and cola mix nicely, especially when you eat the cola bottle with the cookie.  Yum yum!

Recipe - adapted from Home Baking Biscuits and Cookies
Makes 36

• 350g/12oz plain flour
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 2 tsp ground ginger
• 100g/3.5oz butter
• 175g/6oz light brown sugar
• 1 egg yolk
• 4 tbsp cola syrup
• 2 tbsp golden syrup 
• Decorative sugar balls
• 36 cola bottle sweets
• 2 tbsp icing sugar
• Cold water

1. Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/Gas Mark 5 and line a few baking trays with greaseproof paper. 
2. Mix the flour, bicarbonate of soda and ginger together in a bowl.
3. Add the butter in pieces and then rub into the dry ingredients until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.
4. Stir in the sugar and then make a well in the centre.
5. Add the egg yolk, cola syrup and golden syrup and mix together.
6. Knead into a smooth dough.
7. Sprinkle a clean surface with flour and roll out the dough to about 5mm/0.25inches thick.
8. Cut out gingerbread men with a 10cm/4inch cutter.
9. Space out well on the tray as these cookies spread.  Create eyes and buttons by pushing the sugar balls into the dough.
10. Cook for about 10 minutes, until the edges are just starting to brown.
11. Remove and allow to rest on the tray for a minute before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.
12. Once cool, mix the icing sugar with a little water to get a fairly thick icing.
13. Place a blob of icing on one of the hands of each of the gingerbread men and stick a cola bottle sweet to the blob.  Leave to set.

Orange Biscuits

 

 

Oh dear, oh dear.  There is so much disorganisation going on for me right now.  I am afraid I must warn you, dear readers, that my second school placement for my university course has begun and, like last time, the baking is going to take a bit of a hit.  It already has and this blog post has been about two weeks in the making.  It is shocking.  But I was determined to get it up today because there's no way I could not have something go out on the blog's second birthday!  That would be awful.  Of course, I would have preferred a special bake specifically for celebrating the event but that has been delayed.  So I'll be doing a belated birthday post (with much gushing and nostalgia I am sure)...once I figure out what to make.  Yeah, I'm that disorganised right now. 

Luckily though, the next two weeks are the Easter holidays and whilst I should be using them to get a large chunk of my work out of the way I will also have some time for baking.  At the very least there will be the April Dessert Challenge, along with that delayed birthday post.  So I won't be vanishing completely.  Things are just going to be a little slow around here for a couple of months.

Anyway, lets get on to biscuits!  

Back at the start of March I got to go on a merry jaunt to Edinburgh to see my good friend Jess for movies and lunch and shopping.  I went with good intentions in terms of the shopping.  I was planning to get the lace for my wedding dress and a proper cake tester since I'm tired of the holes my bamboo skewers leave when I use them.  That was all.  Unfortunately, I was weak and came away with much more than I intended.  Amongst my unexpected purchases was a new recipe book all about biscuits and cookies.  I really couldn't resist as books with just biscuits in seem to be really hard to come by and biscuits are easily my favourite thing to make.  Plus it was only £3.99!  Also yellow.  I'm terribly attracted to yellow things.  Anyway!  It is fabulous.  So many recipes, several of which are for classic British favourites like Digestives and Nice and Bourbon and Custard Creams and Hobnobs.  The list goes on.  I am going to have to try out the one for Maryland Chocolate Chip Cookies and see if they turn out better than the last recipe I tried that claimed the same title.  Honestly, I was not sure where I was going to start with this book.  There were so many recipes that I was itching to try!  In the end though, I settled for the 'Golden Orange Melts' because they sounded nice and simple and I do love me some orange.  They are also great because you can keep the dough in the fridge for up to a week and just bake some when you feel like.  Which is what I ended up doing.  I did a test batch the day after I originally made the dough and then did not end up cooking the rest until much later in the week.  I will say though, they did turn out a little crispier on the second go.

These are very yummy.  I was sceptical as to how orangey they would taste since I was using zest and juice this time, rather than orange extract like I usually do.  Turns out, they are VERY orangey and they smell amazing!  I ended up taking one each day for a break time snack and unwrapping it from the foil always sent this great burst of orange into the air.  It was great!  They taste really good and have a nice texture.  Like I said before, how crunchy they are seems to change the longer the dough is left in the fridge.  I shall definitely be making these again though.

Recipe - adapted from Home Baking Cookie and Biscuits 
Makes about 30 (the original recipe says 12 but I managed to get a lot more from one batch of dough)

This recipe requires the dough to be chilled overnight!

• 225g/8oz caster sugar
• 100g/3.5oz butter
• 1 egg
• 1 orange
• 300g/11oz plain flour
• 2 tsp baking powder

1. In a large bowl, beat together the butter and sugar until it is pale and creamy.
2. Zest and juice the orange.
3. Beat the egg gently in a separate bowl and then add it and the orange zest to the sugar butter and mix in.
4. Add the flour and baking powder to the mixture along with 2 or 3 teaspoons of the orange juice and mix together to form a reasonably firm dough.
5. Shape the dough into a sausage shape about 30cm/12inches long, wrap in clingfilm and chill in the fridge overnight (and up to a week).
6. Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°/Gas Mark 5 and line 2 or 3 baking trays with baking parchment.
7. Cut slices of dough off the roll, about 1cm/0.5inches thick and space well apart on the trays as they spread a lot whilst baking (I only got 6 on each of my trays: any more resulted in them merging together).
8. Bake for about 10 minutes until the edges are just starting to darken and the rest of the biscuit is a pale golden colour.
9. Allow to rest on the trays for a couple of minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Vanilla Bean Chocolate Chunk Cookies

 

Why yes this is another chocolate chip cookie recipe.  There have been a few of late haven't there?  But I like them and I like trying out new recipes for them because there are so many out there!  Besides, these were to take in to share with a group during a project meeting and I figured most people would like this sort of cookie.  And if not then I could happily eat them myself.

The original recipe looked very tempting, especially as it used vanilla bean paste.  However, I don't have any of that. What I do have though, is 9 vanilla beans, so I thought I'd make use of one of those instead.  Then decided to add just a smidgen of extract too, just for an extra boost.  It worked out lovely.  I also used chunks instead of chips because that is all the local shop had but that was for the best.  There was so much chocolately goodness in each cookie as a result.  The only other thing I changed was the cooking time.  I kept them in just a bit longer than the original because I prefer some crunch to my biscuits.  They still had a slightly soft middle but not too much.

They were amazing cookies!  So so yummy.  Quite a good size and the amount of chunks in them was great.  Plus, since there was no chilling, they were made and baked rather quick (or as quick as I can go with one tray of 6 in the oven at a time).  Everyone who had one really liked them.  I will say though, I thought they tasted better the day after they were made.  They had firmed up just a little more by then and it was really hard not to keep eating them.  I had to be really restrained around my group.  Not so much after I got the leftovers home!

Recipe - adapted from The Domestic Rebel
Makes about 30

• 340g/12oz plain flour
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 2 tsp cornflour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 170g/6oz butter
• 125g/4.5oz light brown sugar
• 45g/1.5oz granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 vanilla bean
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 200g/7oz milk chocolate chunks

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line baking trays with greaseproof paper.
2. Mix the flour, salt, bicarbonate of soda and cornflour together in a medium bowl and set aside.
3. Beat the granulated and brown sugars together with the butter in a large bowl until smooth and creamy.
4. Remove the seeds from the vanilla bean and add to the sugar butter along with the egg and the vanilla extract.  Beat until well mixed.
5. Add the flour gradually, beating in after each addition.
6. Stir in the chocolate chunks.
7. Roll heaped tablespoons of the mixture into balls and place on the trays spaced 5cm/2inches apart.  Flatten slightly.
8. Bake for about 10-15 minutes or until the edges of the cookies are starting to turn golden brown.  Rotate halfway through to ensure even baking.
9. Allow to rest on the trays for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Cola and Cherry Cookies

 

Baking is seriously good for my soul I think.  It had been nearly a month since I last got a chance (or the energy) to bake something and once I managed to get myself into the kitchen and under way with this bake it felt wonderful.  I have not felt so great in quite a while.  There has been a lot of serious de-motivation going on.  Very serious.  Which then leads to brooding and lack of doing anything.  Not good.  So!  Nothing like a baking challenge to get your groove back, even if just some of it.

Well, being the second Thursday of the month, it is time for the Behind the Curtain Dessert Challenge!  The ingredients: Cola and Cherry.

Okay, so this time it wasn't entirely new territory for me.  I have done something with cola before, but not cherry.  However, I remember it being a very popular combination.  A lot of the cola recipes I saw back when I did the Float Cupcakes were cola and cherry.  And of course it is a flavour sold by Coca-Cola.  So I was up for the task of creating something with the flavours.

Since I have made cola cakes previously, I did not feel like doing that again for this challenge.  I wanted to do biscuits!  But how to combine the two flavours?  Why, by making sandwich biscuits.  I decided I wanted to make something similar to my Pink Freens, with a layer of flavoured fondant icing sandwiched between two biscuits.  I knew flavouring icing with jam worked rather well so that would be the cherry bit.  The biscuits would then be cola flavoured.  And since these would be coming out close to Valentine's Day, I figured I could add a little holiday twist by punching a heart shaped hole in the top for the pink fondant to be seen through.

Having made a decision I went looking for ways to make cola cookies.  My initial thought was to find a sugar cookie recipe that I could add the cola flavouring to (either in the form of actual coca-cola, or cola syrup).  Really though, this was overcomplicating things.  I did find a few recipes that involved boiling cola down into a syrup for flavouring but a lot of them recommended using Mexican coke, which has cane sugar in it for its sweetener and I wasn't sure how to go about acquiring that.  Plus there seemed to be mixed reviews on just how cola flavoured the final result was.  Ideally, I wanted something that made use of the cola syrup I already had (though in the end I had to buy a new one anyway since it was out of date) and used a good quantity of it because last time I used it the flavour did not come through very strongly.  And that is exactly what I found over at Sweet Hope Cookies!  Even better was the fact that this dough would not require any chilling time!  I love dough I can use immediately.

It was an amazing dough!  It came together wonderfully after a little trial and error with ingredient amounts (since I was halving the recipe and some ingredient amounts did not halve very easily).  It wasn't too sticky or too dry, it rolled great and it cut great.  It barely spread during baking and the end result was a cookie bursting with cola flavour!  

The fondant bit took a little longer to get right as I wasn't sure how much jam I needed to make a really nice, cherry flavour.  So I kept having the fiancé test it until he was satisfied.  Really I think it depends on the quality of your jam and how strong you want the flavour.  So the instructions in the recipe are to keep going until you are happy with the taste.  Of course, if you have access to cherry extract it will probably make you life much easier.

All in all, I thought these came out really well!  The fiancé calls them indulgent because they are quite thick biscuits but are not too hard or too soft and do not skimp on the fondant.  Plus they taste like cherry cola, which is what I was aiming for.

Recipe - makes about 18


Cookies - adapted from Sweet Hope Cookies

• 400g/14oz plain flour
• 1/3 tsp salt
• 1/3 tsp baking powder
• 115g/4oz butter
• 85g/3oz granulated sugar
• 85g/3oz light brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 60ml/2fl.oz cola syrup

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line some baking trays with greaseproof paper (I ended up with about 5 lots of 8 cookies per tray but only own 2 trays of which I can cook one at a time so...tray number is up to you).
2. Sift the plain flour, salt and baking powder together into a bowl and set aside.
3. Beat the butter and sugars together until smooth and creamy.
4. Add the egg and mix in until incorporated.
5. Add the vanilla extract and the cola syrup and beat until well blended.
6. Add the flour mixture a little at a time, beating well after each addition.  Towards the end you may need to use your hands to bring it all together into a nice smooth dough.
7. Sprinkle a clean surface with a little flour and roll out the dough to 0.5cm/0.25inches thick.  Use a 6.5cm/2.5inch circular cookie cutter to cut out an even number of circles.
8. For half the circles, use a small, heart shaped cutter to cut shapes out of the centre.
9. Transfer cookies to the prepared trays and bake for about 12 minutes.  
10. Allow to cool on the trays before transferring to a wire rack.

Fondant Filling:  

• 200g/oz ready-to-roll fondant icing
• Smooth, seedless cherry jam
• Lots of icing sugar

This is a bit of a trial and error bit.  It really depends on your jam and if you are happy with the flavour.

1. Knead the icing on a clean surface dusted with icing sugar until it is nice and soft and easy to mould.
2. Put 2-3 tbsp jam into a saucepan and heat gently, stirring occasionally, until it has thickened.  Allow to cool slightly.
3. Flatten the icing out slightly, place the jam in the centre and add 2 tbsp icing sugar.
4. Fold up and knead to spread the jam throughout the icing.  Add more icing sugar if necessary to make the icing less sticky.  You want to get back to how it was before you added the jam.
5. Taste the icing.  If you think it needs more flavour, repeat steps 2-4 until you are happy with the result.
6. Roll out the fondant to just less than 0.5cm/0.25inches.  Cut out circles using a 6.5cm/2.5inch cutter.
7. Turn the biscuit circles without the holes in upside down. 
8. Place a fondant circle on top of each biscuit and then cover with a holed one.  Squeeze together gently to bind the cookies and icing so they do not fall apart.

 

Chocolate Chip and Chunk Cookies

I was desiring cookies last week.  Chocolate filled cookies.  Lots of chocolate but without being an entirely chocolate cookie because I don't like those very much.  I could have made one of my other chocolate chips cookie recipes (I do have three others on here already) but where's the fun in that?  And it never hurts to have yet another recipe for such things.  They are all somewhat different so I can pick and choose based on what I'm in the mood for and how much waiting I can stand to do.

I wanted to try this recipe after seeing the photos.  Seriously, the photos from the original post are so gorgeous and the cookies look so inviting.  The oozy chocolate makes your mouth water.  Maybe they were shot straight from the oven, though after the required cooling period of course?  They are delicious right after said period, by the way.  Extra soft too.

So yes, this is a soft cookie recipe.  Very soft.  But oh so good, especially considering there was 340g/12oz of chocolate spread between 18 cookies in the form of chips and chunks.  Good quality chocolate too as I used Cadbury's Dairy Milk for my chunks.  I honestly recommend you choose your favourite chocolate for these cookies, which is why I did not specify a type in the recipe write up.  They are a fabulous cookie.  Both the fiancé and I have been enjoying them immensely.

Recipe - adapted from Averie Cooks
Makes about 18

• 170g/6oz butter
• 115g/4oz light brown sugar
• 40g/1.5oz caster sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 225g/8oz plain flour
• 2 tsp cornflour
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 170g/6oz chocolate chips
• 170g/6oz chocolate

1. Beat the butter in a large bowl until it is smooth.
2. Add the brown sugar and caster sugar to the butter and beat until creamy and pale.
3. Mix in the egg and the vanilla extract.
4. Add the flour, salt, cornflour and bicarbonate of soda to the mix and stir together until just incorporated.
5. Cut the chocolate into bite size chunks and add it and the chocolate chips to the dough.  Fold in.
6. Scoop out 60g/2oz amounts of dough and place on a plate or two.
7. Cover the plate with clingfilm and chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours (mine were chilling for about 4).
8. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line 2-3 baking trays with greaseproof paper.
9. Transfer the scoops of dough to the trays, spacing them about 5cm/2inches apart.  (I got 4 on a tray but I have small trays for a small oven).
10. Bake until the edges of the cookies are just starting to turn gold.  This will range from 8-15 minutes.  (The original recipe said 8-10 minutes but mine took longer).  The centres will still be very soft and will be pale.
11. Allow to sit on the tray for 5 minutes after removing from the oven before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies

So Christmas has come and gone.  It was a good one.  I got some fabulous things, including a number of new additions for my kitchen (which I now need to find space for) and some photo editing software that I have been coveting for a while.  There was also great food and lots of rushing about visiting people.  Admittedly I did end up feeling a bit homesick.  It's been three years since I was home for Christmas.  It is one of the downsides to living so far away with erratic circumstances: planning anything is nearly impossible.  But maybe I'll get to go down next year.

Anyway, since me being at university means there is only one source of income at the moment, plus the fact that we are planning and paying for a wedding next year, funds are a bit low.  There was money for buying presents for immediate family but extended family that we would be seeing on Christmas and Boxing Day, not so much.  But I love giving presents to people so I decided I would make the presents!  Or bake as the case actually is.  So December 23rd and 24th were spent baking over 200 biscuits!  I've never made so many before.  It was exhausting but worth it!  The majority were my favourite chocolate dipped orange shortbread (cut into stars), which were for the grandparents, aunts, uncles and older cousins.  The younger cousins got chewy chocolate chip cookies.  I didn't think either of those would suit the last giftee though, since he is only 3.  So I made something new just for him: banana chocolate chip cookies.

Unfortunately, I cannot provide his verdict on the cookies.  However, the fiancé got to eat the spares and he says they are very banana-ry and there's lots of chocolate chips to compliment it.  They're also slightly crunchy.  Yum yum!

Recipe - adapted from Biscuit via Baking Heaven volume 2

Makes about 24

• 100g/3.5oz butter
• 100g/3.5oz golden caster sugar
• 100g/3.5oz banana (about 1 banana)
• 200g/7oz plain flour
• 100g/3.5oz milk chocolate chips

1. Mash the banana in a large bowl with a fork.
2. Add the butter and sugar and beat together until smooth and creamy.  If it starts to curdle, add a spoonful of the flour.
3. Add the remaining flour and the chocolate chips to the mixture.  Beat together until a soft, sticky dough forms.
4. Form dough into a rough ball and wrap in clingfilm.  Chill in the fridge for 2-3 hours.
5. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line 2 baking trays with greaseproof paper.
6. Shape the dough into balls about the size of a walnut, place on the trays spaced about 3cm/1.5inches apart and then flatten them with a wet fork.
7. Bake for about 15-20 minutes or until the edges of the biscuits are golden brown.  The centres will still be a little soft.
8. Allow to rest on the trays for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling. 

White Chocolate and Cranberry Shortbread

Well, long time no see.  It has been a rather hectic few weeks since I last made an entry, all the way back in early November.  That's rather terrible but between teaching and paperwork there has been no time for anything else other than some dinner and not enough sleep.  Good news is, at the end of it all, I passed!  I am officially halfway through my course!  And now I'm on holiday for a few weeks (though there is a 4000 word essay to do...) and have plenty of baking planned since lack of funds means a lot of people are getting home baked presents.  Admittedly, a number of those will be some of my favourites featured in previous posts but I am determined to try something new whilst I have the chance.

In fact, that is what today's post is!  These were part of the gift bag I put together as a 'thank you' for the teacher whose class I have been working in the past 9 weeks.  Now I know I used cranberries and white chocolate together only a couple of posts ago but she likes that combination, and is a big shortbread fan so I knew that if I was going to bake her something it would have to contain all those elements.  Finding a recipe was pretty easy and the one I ended up using was pretty hassle free.  My only complaints would be that the dough was VERY sticky and that I had to cook them slightly longer than recommended.  Other than that though, I think they turned out rather well and were certainly less hassle than the last cookies I made.  It's definitely a recipe I'll be squirrelling away for future gift purposes.  

As my resident taste tester, the fiancé says the biscuits are beautifully sweet and crunchy like he thinks shortbread should be, and that the cranberries and white chocolate compliment each other beautifully.  Hopefully my mentor teacher enjoys them as much.

Recipe - adapted from taste.com
Makes about 36

• 250g/8oz butter
• 125g/4.5oz icing sugar
• 1.5 tsp vanilla extract
• 300g/10.5oz plain flour
• 75g/2.5oz dried cranberries
• 100g/3.5oz white chocolate chips

1. Preheat the oven to 160°C/325°F/Gas Mark 3 and line 3 baking trays with greaseproof paper.
2. Beat the butter, icing sugar and vanilla extract together in a bowl until it is very pale and creamy.
3. Stir in the flour, cranberries and chocolate chips and bring together to form a dough.  It will be quite sticky.
4. Roll tablespoon sized portions of dough into balls and place them on the prepared trays, spaced about 5cm/2inches apart.  Flatten slightly with a fork (you may wish to dip the fork in flour to prevent it sticking to the biscuits).
5. Chill the biscuits in the fridge for about 20 minutes.
6. Bake for 15-25 minutes (the original recipe said 15-18 but mine ended up needing 25) until the edges are just starting to turn golden and are slightly firm.  The middles will still feel soft.
7. Remove from the oven and allow to rest on the trays for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.