PASTA FROLLA FOR LINZER-STYLE COOKIES

Posted in Cookies by sallybr

Some baking projects make me very happy. This was definitely one. For starters, the idea to make them came from my dear friend Jill, who shared a picture she saw in a Facebook group, and led me to investigate how to get my hands into those cookie cutters. It turns out, they are from Italy. That did not stop me….

PASTA FROLLA COOKIES WITH RASPBERRY JAM
(From the The Bewitching Kitchen)

200 g butter, cut in pieces and softened
75 g powdered sugar
40 g honey
2 g salt
1 egg yolk
1/2 tsp vanilla paste
300 g all-purpose flour
raspberry jam for filling
powdered sugar to shower the assembled cookies (optional)

Mix the flour with salt, reserve.

In the bowl of a KitchenAid type mixer, beat the butter with powdered sugar and honey until lighter in color and the sugar is fully dissolved, about 2 minutes. Add the yolk and vanilla paste, and mix well at low-speed.

Gradually add the flour/salt mixture. Mix until fully combined, but it is best to finish mixing by hand. Remove the dough from the bowl, wrap in plastic refrigerate at least 4 hours, preferably overnight.

Roll the dough, one half at a time 1/8 inch thick. Cut shapes (tops and bottoms) and bake at 350F for 10 to 12 minutes, depending on the size. Remove shapes that are smaller as they get ready.

Once the cookies are cool, cover the bottom part with raspberry jam and add the top half. Shower with powdered sugar before serving, if so desired.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Comments: Pasta Frolla might very well be my favorite for cookies at the present time. Texture, taste, everything works. As to the cookie cutters, they can be found here. Beware, that site has things that are VERY hard to say no to. I did not worry about how long it would take for shipping, and it was a little less than 1 month. Not bad. Here is the set I used for this first adventure.

You will need two of the large 7-petal flower, 14 of the other two shapes. Then the smaller cutter is used to make the empty space in half of the cookies before baking. It is best to do the cut while the dough is still in the large cutters as I show below:

By doing that, you prevent the dough from getting distorted as you cut the inner portion out.

The other thing to consider is that the cut shapes will bake faster. Either bake them separately or be sure to remove them before the larger pieces get done, or they will brown too much.

I am totally in love with this cookie set…
Stay tuned for more “Italian Adventures” in the future.

ONE YEAR AGO: Ravioli Cookies, the Shortest Path to Insanity

TWO YEARS AGO: Peanut Butter and Jelly Babka and a Cookbook Review

THREE YEARS AGO: Painted Sourdough

FOUR YEARS AGO: Over-the-Moon Blueberry Lemon Macarons

FIVE YEARS AGO: Springtime Macarons Bake-Along

SIX YEARS AGO: Macarons for a Little Princess

SEVEN YEARS AGO: Gilding the Sourdough Loaf

EIGHT YEARS AGO: Lolita Joins the Bewitching Kitchen

NINE YEARS AGO: Cashew Cream Sauce

TEN YEARS AGO: Blood Orange Margaritas

ELEVEN YEARS AGO: Smoked Salmon Appetizer

TWELVE YEARS AGO: Clementine Cake

THIRTEEN YEARS AGO: Springtime Spinach Risotto

FOURTEEN YEARS AGO: The end of green bean cruelty

FIFTEEN YEARS AGO: Torta di Limone e Mandorle

10Dec2024

THREE LITTLE COOKIES FOR THE HOLIDAYS

Posted in Cookies by sallybr

The holiday season is all about baking, so today I offer three ideas for cookies that may not be on your radar. I start with a recipe recently shared by the baking queen extraordinaire, Helen Fletcher.

SERBIAN WALNUT COOKIES

SERBIAN WALNUT COOKIES
(from Helen Fletcher’s blog)

for the filling:
¾ cup apricot preserves
1 ½ teaspoon gelatin
1 tablespoon cider vinegar

for the cookies:
1 cup walnuts (114 grams)
½ cup unsalted butter, softened (114 grams)
1 cup + 1 T granulated sugar (75 grams)
1 large egg yolk
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla
1 ¼ cups all-purpose flour (175 grams)
2 cups powdered sugar (260 grams)

Make the filling, if you prefer, a few days in advance. Place the apricot preserves in the bowl of a processor. Process until smooth. Dissolve the gelatin in the vinegar in a very small bowl. Heat the preserves just to a simmer. Remove from the heat. Tear the gelatin into about 6 pieces and immediately add it to the hot preserves. Wait for a minute or two until you can see the gelatin has liquified. Stir it into the preserves. Transfer to a small container and refrigerate until needed.

Make the cookies: Heat the oven to 325°F. Line a couple of baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside. Place the walnuts on a rimmed baking sheet and toast for 7 to 10 minuts until fragrant and slightly browned. Cool completely. When cool, place the walnuts and flour in the bowl of a processor. Process until the nuts are finely ground and instinguishable. Set aside.

Place the butter and sugar in the bowl of a mixer. Beat until light. Add the egg yolk and vanilla and beat to combine. Add the flour mixture and beat on low just until completely incorporated. The dough should be good to roll out but if it is too soft, refrigerate briefly. Place the dough between two large pieces of waxed or parchment paper. Roll the dough to abut ¼” thick. With a 1 ½” round cutter, cut the cookies out, keeping them close together.

Remove the top piece of waxed paper and, keeping the cookies on the bottom pieces of paper, transfer the whole thing to a baking sheet. Freeze until rock hard. When frozen, punch them out and place them on a cookie sheet. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes from the frozen state until lightly browned and firm. Cool completely.

Assemble the cookies: Stir the filling vigorously to smooth it out. Turn half the cookies upside down and fill with about ¾ teaspoon apricot filling. Place the tops on the cookies. Allow the filled cookie to set up on a rack overnight to tighten the filling. Store in an airtight container for a week or 10 days.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Comments: These cookies are so delicious that they can stand on their own without the filling: nutty, great texture, not too sweet. I advise you to stop by Helen’s site so you can see all the detailed pictures and step by step instructions. I love the way she adds gelatin to a store-bough concoction to make it perfectly set in the sandwich cookie. I don’t like fillings that ooze out when you hold or bite into the cookie. She definitely knows all the great tricks in the baking world… I omitted the showering with powdered sugar, as they are easier to box and share without the sugar coating. Excellent cookies, make sure to give this recipe a try. As I’ve said many times over the years, you cannot go wrong baking with Helen!

BLUEBERRY SWIRL MERINGUE COOKIES

BLUEBERRY SWIRL MERINGUE COOKIES
(from The Bewitching Kitchen)

120g egg whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
pinch of salt
200 g sugar (about 1 cup)
2 tsp cornstarch
1 tsp vanilla paste
blueberry jam, about 1 cup

Heat oven to 200°F and line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Combine the egg whites, cream of tartar, and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Whisk on low to combine, then turn the speed up to medium and whip until frothy. With the mixer is still running, add the sugar in small increments. Once all the sugar has been added, turn the speed up to high and whip until the meringue is glossy, thick, and holds stiff peaks, about 3 minutes.

Sprinkle the cornstarch and vanilla on top and fold gently to combine. Divide the meringue into 12 equal rounds, using a cookie or ice cream scoop or two spoons. Spoon a small amount of blueberry jam on top of the meringue and use a chopstick to gently swirl it. Bake the meringues for 2 hours, then turn the oven off and allow the meringues to cool gradually inside the oven for another hour. Store leftover meringues in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Comments: These are pretty amazing, and you can add different jams and I imagine it would work well with Nutella also! Make them big, I think they turn out better this way.

BISCOCHITOS

BISCOCHITOS
(from The New York Times)

½ cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature
¾ cup (150 grams) sugar
1 tablespoon anise seeds
1 large egg
1 tablespoon grated orange zest
2 teaspoons vanilla paste or vanilla extract
2 cups (260 grams) all-purpose flour
1 cup (116 grams) yellow masa or finely ground yellow cornmeal
1½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon coarse kosher salt
2 tablespoons rum or brandy (optional)

FOR THE TOPPING:
½ cup (100 grams) sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Small pinch of coarse kosher salt (such as Morton)

Prepare the dough: In the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment beat softened butter with sugar on medium-high until well combined, about 2 minutes.
While butter is creaming, toast the anise seeds in a small skillet on medium heat for 30 to 35 seconds until fragrant, just to open up the flavor. Transfer to a mortar and pestle, or crush under a heavy pan, and grind to medium fine.

Add the egg, toasted anise seed, orange zest and vanilla to the butter mixture and beat for 2 to 3 more minutes, scraping the sides, until well combined. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, masa, baking powder and salt.

In two additions, with the mixer on low speed, add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture, scraping down the sides of the bowl each time. Increase speed to medium-high and beat until well combined but crumbly. Add rum or brandy, if using, and beat for another 30 seconds to 1 minute, until the dough comes fully together.

Place the cookie dough between two pieces of parchment paper and roll out evenly to ¼- to ½-inch thickness. Freeze for at least 10 minutes, or refrigerate for 20 to 30 minutes. The cookies will keep a sharper shape depending on how cold they are when they go into the oven.

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Make the cinnamon sugar topping: In a small bowl, whisk together the sugar, cinnamon and salt; set aside. Once the oven is at temperature, remove the dough from the freezer, remove the top parchment layer and cut the dough with a cookie cutter into your preferred shapes, such as stars. Gather any dough scraps and combine them into a disk. Roll and repeat the cookie-cutting process, chilling as necessary. Line 2 large baking sheets with nonstick baking mats or with parchment. Transfer cut cookies, spacing 1 inch apart, to the prepared baking sheets. Sprinkle the cookies with the cinnamon sugar topping.

Bake the cookies, rotating the sheets after 8 minutes, until the cookies are light brown around the edges but still pale in the center, 13 to 15 minutes total. Cool the cookies on the sheets for 3 to 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Store the cooled cookies in an airtight container for up to 3 days.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Comments: These are very unusual and quite addictive. I was surprised by how sharp the edges turned out even though there is quite a bit of baking powder in the recipe, made me wonder about adding a touch of masa harina to sugar cookies and see what happens. A friend of mine made this recipe and it turned out hard to roll out, very crumbly, so if that happens to you, add some milk to the dough to make it smoother. Probably less than a tablespoon is all you’ll need. I love their flavor and texture, I hope you also give this recipe a try during the holidays, they are perfect to include in a cookie box, as they are quite sturdy and last well. at room temperature.

ONE YEAR AGO: Two Festive Cakes, Part One

TWO YEARS AGO: Broccoli Slaw Salad with Poppy Seed Dressing

THREE YEARS AGO: Vegan Blueberry-Lemon Cheesecake

FOUR YEARS AGO: Green Tea Rice with Edamame and Butternut Squash

FIVE YEARS AGO: Santa Hat Mini-Mousse Cakes

SIX YEARS AGO: Fun with Sourdough

SEVEN YEARS AGO: Pasteis de Nata

EIGHT YEARS AGO: New Mexico Pork Chile, Crockpot Version

NINE YEARS AGO: Chocolate on Chocolate

TEN YEARS AGO: Double Chocolate and Mint Cookies

ELEVEN YEARS AGO: The Story of my first Creme Brulle’

TWELVE YEARS AGO: Sourdough Mini-rolls

THIRTEEN YEARS AGO: Focaccia with Sun-dried Tomatoes and Gorgonzola

FOURTEEN YEARS AGO: Mediterranean Skewers

FIFTEEN YEARS AGO Fettuccine with Shrimp, Swiss Chard, and Tomatoes

8Sep2024

CARAMEL SANDWICH COOKIES

Posted in Cookies by sallybr

Today I share three versions of Caramel Sandwich Cookies. The first recipe (top left) is my default (Chocolate Chipotle Cookies that you can find here). The second version (bottom right) was made using Sweetapolita Bakebook recipe for Dark Chocolate Cutout Cookies which I won’t share due to copyright issues. At any rate, as written the recipe is a bit too strong for my taste, I would advise using less dark cocoa powder particularly if you are baking for kids. The lighter cookie (bottom left) is Cinnamon Orange, and the recipe is below.

CINNAMON-ORANGE SUGAR COOKIE
(from The Bewitching Kitchen)

1 cup butter (226 g), at room temperature
1 cup sugar (200g)
zest of half a large orange
1/4 cup agave nectar
2 eggs
1 tsp orange bakery emulsion or orange extract of your choice
575 g all-purpose flour (about 4 cups)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking powder

Heat the oven to 350 F and line baking sheets with parchment. Mix the flour, cinnamon, baking powder and salt, and set aside. Mix the sugar with the zest rubbing it well to release the oils. Cream the butter with the flavored sugar, just until smooth and combined. Add the agave nectar and continue mixing for a minute or so.

In a small bowl whisk the eggs and orange emulsion. Add to the butter-sugar mixture and mix at low speed until combined. Add the flour mixture on low-speed, until it forms a dough.

Remove the dough from the bowl, cut in two pieces and wrap them in plastic. Refrigerate for one hour, then roll, cut shapes and bake in 350 F oven until golden at the edges, depending on the size of the cookies, 10 to 15 minutes. For these cookies, I used a patterned rolling pin.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

Rolling pin available at etsy (click here)

For both chocolate cookies, I used a stamp to create the design on the top portion of the cookie. One of them is available here, the other I could not find any longer, had it for many years.

I have tried two different recipes for caramel filling, but the second one was far better in terms of texture and flavor. You can find it here. I made half the recipe published in the site.

The caramel filling complements quite well both the chocolate and the orange cookies, very versatile, and it has the perfect texture to bite into. I think that embossed rolling pins and springerle-type stamps are a very nice way to embellish sandwich cookies.

ONE YEAR AGO: Miso-Caramel Cracker Cookies

TWO YEARS AGO: Mooncakes for Mid-Autumn Festival

THREE YEARS AGO: Almond-Raspberry Triangles and a Special Cookbook Review

FOUR YEARS AGO: Sweet and Spicy Roasted Cauliflower

FIVE YEARS AGO: Roasted Cauliflower Salad over Hummus

SIX YEARS AGO: Queen of Sheba

SEVEN YEAR AGO: Brunch Burger

EIGHT YEARS AGO: Mango Salsa with Verjus

NINE YEARS AGO: Raspberry Bittersweet Chocolate Chunk Brownies

TEN YEARS AGO: Scary Good Pork Burgers

ELEVEN YEARS AGO: Review of exercise program Focus25

TWELVE YEARS AGO: Celebrate Wednesday with a Thai Seafood Curry

THIRTEEN YEARS AGO: Post-workout Breakfast

FOURTEEN YEARS AGO: Semolina Barbecue Buns

FIFTEEN YEARS AGO: Lavash Crackers

12Jul2024

RED VELVET SUGAR COOKIES, THREE WAYS

Posted in Cookies by sallybr

This dough will work well for stamps or to roll out thin or thick. Delicious, nice texture, and a very small amount of baking powder to make sure your design will stay nicely imprinted. Embossed rolling pins will be another option, so keep that in mind.

RED VELVET SUGAR COOKIES
(slightly modified from Fancy Flours)

1 cup butter at room temperature (226g)
1 + 1/2 cups powdered sugar (170g)
1 large egg
1 tablespoon Red Velvet Emulsion
1 tablespoon cocoa powder (I used Dutch processed)
1/4 cup melted chocolate chips
3 cups flour (360g)
1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tablespoon dry buttermilk powder
3/4 tsp salt

Mix flour, baking powder, buttermilk powder and salt in a large bowl. Reserve. Cream butter and sugar in the bowl of a standing mixer with a paddle attachment. Add egg. Mix in red velvet emulsion, vanilla, cocoa, and melted chocolate.

Blend in the dry ingredients reserved. Mix until dough pulls away from the paddle and begins to form a ball. Dust the surface of your counter and rolling pin with flour and roll out the dough to a thickness of approximately 3/8 inch to 1/2 inch. (If your dough is too soft to work with, refrigerate it for an hour or so.

Dust the surface of your dough and your cookie mold with flour. Press the mold into the dough just far enough down to fill the mold cavity. Remove your mold and cut out the cookie. Brush off the excess flour on the top of your cookie. Excess flour will appear white on the surface if not removed.
Place your cookies on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.

Freeze your cookies for 15 minutes, bake from frozen in a 350F oven until done, depending on the size, 10 to 13 minutes.

ENJOY!

to print the recipe, click here

STAMPED RED VELVET COOKIES

Very simple to make, just roll, press the stamp and bake. I bake most of my cookies over a perforated mat. After baking, I sprayed a little bit of PME pearl luster over the surface, but that is optional.

LEMON GANACHE SANDWICH COOKIES.

I rolled them a little thinner, cut circles from half the cookies, and used a bench scraper to create a design on the cookies with a hole in the center. The lemon ganache I used is from this macaron post.

MODERN DESIGN

Cookies were simple rounds. To decorate them, I used compound chocolate spread over chocolate transfer sheets, a method I use often for Chocolate-covered Oreos. Let the chocolate set, cut circles smaller than the diameter of your cookies. Glue the disc to a cooled cookie with a bit of Royal icing or melted chocolate. Below the cookies and a little Chocolate-covered Oreo with the same “outfit”.

I love the texture and flavor of these cookies, and intend to use them often in the future. And guess what? You can also use Royal icing to decorate them! Designs inspired by The Graceful Baker.

ONE YEAR AGO: Lemon Macarons

TWO YEARS AGO: Thai Chicken with Peanut Sauce

THREE YEARS AGO: Baharat Flower Sourdough

FOUR YEARS AGO: Biscoitinhos de Canela

FIVE YEARS AGO: Salmon Tacos

SIX YEARS AGO: The Chignon

SEVEN YEARS AGO: Rack of Lamb Sous-Vide with Couscous Salad

EIGHT YEARS AGO: Focaccia with Grapes, Roquefort and Truffled Honey

NINE YEARS AGO: Moroccan Carrot Dip over Cucumber Slices

TEN YEARS AGO: White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies

ELEVEN YEARS AGO: Cilantro-Jalapeno “Hummus”

TWELVE YEARS AGO:A Moving Odyssey

THIRTEEN YEARS AGO:Hoegaarden Beer Bread

FOURTEEN YEARS AGO: Ancho-Chile Marinade: Pleased to Meat you!

8Jul2024

RASPBERRY VOVO, AND SAVOUR ONLINE COOKING CLASSES

Posted in Cookies, Desserts, Desserts, Sweets by sallybr

Coconut biscuit, raspberry jam, and marshmallow. Those three together are the key to a treat to make you smile. Looks adorable, tastes amazing… What’s not to like? Well, if you are not fond of coconut, make a plain biscuit, it will still be wonderful. I cannot share the exact recipe I used, because it is part of Savour Cooking School, but similar recipes can be found online. Like this one.

I’ve been a member of Savour for a long time. In fact, I joined just a couple of months after they launched the site. Kirsten Tibballs – pure royalty in the Australian Patisserie World – is the founder and the major engine behind the school. Classes are super detailed, and divided in “beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels”. I will not lie to you, the beginner level can be quite involved, and the advanced a sure ticket to hyperventilation and despair. But of course, totally worth it! Even if I don’t bake a lot of the things they teach, I learn a lot by watching the videos. If you’d like to join, visit the site with a click here. I cannot share their recipes, but today I show you three bakes I’ve made following Kirsten’s classes.

RASPBERRY VOVO

These are just outstanding. Reading about them, it turns out that there are two versions, one from Australia, one from Ireland (called Mikado). The Australian version uses fondant and the Irish calls for marshmallow, which is what Kirsten taught in class. You can read more about it here. I find it intriguing that the name (vovo) means “grandpa” in Portuguese, but could not quite find the origin of the name in Australia. The recipe starts with baking some coconut shortbread, then making raspberry jam, and the delicious raspberry marshmallow that gets piped at the edges. A little warm knife is the secret to get the marshmallow cut nicely in between the cookies. Some of the steps are shown below…

Recently Kirsten launched a challenge, picking one recipe from the hundreds available and asking members to make it and share the pictures. I participated of two of these monthly challenges.

DULCE ROCHER

These are considered “beginner” level at Savour. You will make a shortbread cookie, a whipped caramel for the filling, sugar-coated hazelnuts for the coating, and finally temper some milk chocolate. I loved making these but a word of caution: since each cookie will be coated in chocolate/nuts, make sure they are rolled thin to start with, or you will end up with a massive sandwich cookie. Finesse matters here! Some of the steps are shown below…

Can you imagine the taste of all that caramel plus the cookie, chocolate, and the crunch of the sugared hazelnuts? It is a dream in cookie shape! Lots of members participated of the challenge, the person who won made them super cute in square shape, she really deserved the prize (in that case it was quite a bit of high quality chocolate, and, yes, I would have loved to be the winner!).

STRAWBERRY AND CREAM CHOUX BUNS

If you can believe it, this is also considered beginner level (cough, cough). Components to make these beauties: choux buns with a craquelin coating, strawberry compote, cinnamon crumble, and white chocolate chantilly. The result is totally worth the work, trust me. Since they are too messy to donate to the homeless, I took them to our department and well, let’s say there were a bunch of super happy Professors and graduate students. Mission accomplished!

If you like to take your baking up several notches, I highly recommend joining Savour (click here). Plus there is a nice community online through their Facebook page, where you can see what everyone else is baking, and share kitchen adventures.