Cashew Nut Cookies

I'm one of those people who likes to give homemade gifts away to other people during festive seasons. Some people might think me a cheapskate or slightly weird or that I just have too much time on my hands, especially when its so much simpler to pop into a store and buy a prettily packaged tasty treat these days. But I am a traditionalist when it comes to gifting - I think it just says so much more when a person puts in time and love to make something just for you to enjoy.

So just as that time of year comes rolling around, I push up my sleeves, get my tools out and get busy - usually baking. You can see some of my previous attempts here. Admittedly I also use this as an excuse to test out ideas that I like or new craft techniques I want to try :)

Anyways, this Hari Raya season I wanted to bake some yummies to give to all the relatives whose houses we were invited to and there was no way I would turn up empty handed. Naturally I had to come up with something local that fit the season so I decided to try my hand at making one of my all time favourites : cashew nut cookies. 

I looked around online for recipes and found that it was a lot harder to pick one that I thought. For starters, I've tried different types of store-bought cookies and the ones I liked best were crumbly yet crunchy. It was hard to tell from pictures which one would give me that result. Some of the recipes were also a lot simpler than others in terms of ingredients and it got me wondering whether the traditional recipes were actually that simple after all. In the end, I reckon it'll be a matter of trying a bunch of recipes before finding one that suits my taste. 

With that said, I went ahead with baking a huge batch of cookies following the recipe from Kitchen Tigress. Despite that, my cookies did not turn out like hers, my batter was a lot runnier and I ended up putting it in the fridge for some time to harden up before I could shape it. I could not use my cookie cutter as it was too sticky so I just made balls of dough and pressed the nuts on to them. 

Start by splitting your cashew nuts in halves. Keep the nicer looking ones for the tops of your cookies (about 150g worth). Toast ALL of the nuts for  about 15 mins at 180 degrees Celsius until theres a rich aroma and the nuts are a golden brown colour. Put the nice looking ones aside for later. For the remaining 200g of nuts, grind them in a food processor until its a fine powder.

 

The rest of the recipe is below. As I mentioned, my dough was still pretty runny so I wrapped it in cellophane and put it in the fridge to stiffen up. I found it easier to make little balls and press the nice cashew nut on top. 

Be careful about crowding your cookie sheet! These cookies spread quite a bit while baking. 

Unfortunately, I didn't take any photos before the cookies went into the oven and after they came out. But you can see how they turned out and they actually did taste a lot better than they looked. Still though, it wasn't quite the crumbly cookies I had envisioned so my search for the ultimate recipe continues. 

In the meantime, Eid Mubarak to everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful festive season :)

Make Your Own!
Recipe adapted from Kitchen Tigress.

150 g unsalted butter
180 g caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
1/4 tsp salt
200 g plain flour, sifted
1/2 tsp baking powder

200 g raw cashew nuts - bake nuts at 180 degrees Celcius till golden brown and fragrant. Leave to cool then mince in a food processor until fine

150 g raw cashew nut halves - bake nuts at 180 degrees Celcius till golden brown and fragrant.

1 egg, beaten, for egg wash

1. Whisk butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Add egg, vanilla and salt. Add flour and baking powder. Mix in ground nuts. If its sticky, add 1 - 2 tablespoons of flour or chill till its firm enough to handle. 

2. Pinch dough and form small balls and press lightly on a baking tray lined with baking paper, leaving 2-inch space between cookies as they will spread during baking. Brush the tops of cookies with egg, place a cashew nut halve on top and brush with egg again. 

3. Bake at 170 degree Celcius for 12 - 15 mins, until cookies are golden brown. Leave to cool on a wire rack then transfer to an air tight container. 

Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanutbutter Frosting

I have yet another confession to make: I only discovered the amazing-ness that was Chocolate and Peanutbutter together some 4 months ago. Yes, thats right. For an entire 29 years, I considered this to be a bizarre combination but just as I crossed my last birthday, I finally made myself try it and OH MY GOD, what have I been missing!!!!

Needless to say that since then, I've been somewhat obsessed with this combination so it really was a matter of time before I had to make these for myself.

I started with a basic chocolate cake recipe, adapted from this one, and made a batch of cupcakes. What I especially love about this recipe is that the cake comes out wonderfully light and moist, perfect for a heavy topping like peanutbutter.

For the peanut butter frosting, I scouted the web for a recipe but ended up just kinda winging it. I knew I wanted the rich peanut butter flavour but it couldn't just taste like I spread the stuff straight out of the jar. It needed a smoother consistency for piping. I kept it pretty simple with just butter, peanut butter, icing sugar, vanilla extract and a pinch of salt.

I have to admit it was really yummy, I had to stop myself from "taste testing" all of it.

And ta da!

By far one of the yummiest cupcakes I've ever made, if I do say so myself. The cake was super soft and moist and not too sweet and the peanutbutter gave it just the right twang of sweet and salty. Delish!!

Make your own:

For the cake:
Basic Chocolate Cake - Baked as cupcakes.

For the frosting:
3/4 cup of unsalted butter, softened
1 1/4 cup smooth peanut butter
2 1/2 cups icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbs milk
a pinch of salt

1. Cream butter and peanut butter together till smooth. Add vanilla extract.

2. Sift in icing sugar. You can add more if you prefer a sweeter buttercream. Personally I liked the stronger peanut butter taste.

3. If your butter cream is too thick or sticky, you can add in 1 - 2 tablespoons of milk to get the consistency you prefer.

4. Add a pinch of salt.

This is a good stiff icing that holds shapes well so I went with a large star tip and made simple swirls.

Enjoy!

Red Velvet Cupcakes Again

This is not a new recipe but definitely a favourite :) We made these yesterday on request from a friend and I was really pleased with how they turned out. I particularly love this mini two-bites size because it yields something like 80 + cupcakes which is perfect for sharing and giving away (while still having lots left for yourself!) Yum!

You can check out the recipe here and bake your own!

Christmas Tree Baubles

I have been missing for too long! I know, I'm sorry.

I have been baking of course but its mostly been repeats of stuff I've made before so I figured it would not be worth posting. But then I made some new stuff and was just lazy about putting it up.

To catch up, I'm going to pick up where I left off... when I said I'd be baking holiday gifts and posting about them.

A week or so before Christmas, my mum-in-law came over for a baking date. I was particularly inspired by her as she bakes a range of cookies every year just before Christmas for the season. I had been poking around online before that and saw a bunch of cute gift ideas so I'd decided that I wanted to make little biscuits to fit into small jars. Using a basic butter cookie recipe, we colored the dough and then rolled them into small balls. This is where it was handy that I had more hands than my own because this took AGES, even with 3 people.

We made a large batch of biscuit dough, divided it into four parts and colored it using normal food coloring which was kneaded into the dough. Then we rolled away!

After baking them, we rolled them in sugar and mixed the colors.

Meanwhile, I created some labels on my computer. I had picked up some jars at IKEA so the labels were made according to those sizes.

I printed them on card paper and cut them out.

I then went on to adorn my jars with ribbons and paper rosettes and lined them with paper doilies.

I thought the colored biscuits looked like Christmas Tree baubles and thought it might be a cute name for them :)

Finally, I filled the jars with the little biscuits which we had baked.

After that, the fun part, I gave them away and got many a pleased reaction as people appreciated the homemade gift :)

I made fondant!

So I've been baking lots since I started this blog but unfortunately neglected to blog about it... which just means I'll have to bake those things again so I can take photos and post them up :) Of my more successful attempts were my Cheese Cupcakes, which were essentially cupcake-sized cheesecakes and turned out to be very well received indeed. Considering it was my first attempt and I only started making them around midnight on a Saturday (because that is how I party...), I was pretty pleased at how they turned out. 

But anyways! I'll definitely be making that again so stay tuned for that. Onto today's post:

So last night, I decided to be really ambitious and make my own fondant. It really started with me trying to think of ways to make my red velvet cuppycakes look prettier seeing as one of Husband's colleagues ordered up a big batch of them for her wedding (!!!) and I have to deliver them this Thursday. I thought it might be pretty to do some decorations with fondant. I'd tried store-bought fondant before but frankly, I can't stand how it tastes. Then, earlier this year, following a recipe from one of my favourite cupcake books, Nic managed to make some fondant for our daughter's baptism cake. I found the flavour a lot more tolerable than the store bought kind so I decided to stick with that recipe. 

Let's get one thing out in the open: when Nic made it, I wasn't there for some reason. I was probably tending to the baby or something. But in doing so, when I embarked on my fondant making process yesterday, I simply figured, if Nic could do it, how hard could it be?

It was hard.

I started around 9pm and didn't finish till about 11. In terms of ingredients, there wasn't that much to it but it took ages to knead into a pliable dough! I started out by trying to knead it in smaller palm-sized balls and then adding it together but that led to a lot of leftover icing sugar that wasn't getting incorporated. Then I figured out that my popping it into the microwave for a few seconds (like 10 - 20 at a go) it softened up the mixture so that it was easily pliable and could absorb more sugar. Be wary of microwaving too much though! I think I might have overdone it and the texture of my fondant is a bit dry and crumbly now. 

Still, after much kneading and a bit of microwaving, it finally came together! I wrapped the ball in cling film and left it outside overnight. From what I gather, the fondant will keep for 1 - 2 months so long as it is tightly cling filmed and kept in a cool, dry place. Do not put it in the fridge or freezer. 

Now that I had my fondant, I was ready to experiment with decorations. I tore off a small chunk of the fondant (and covered the unused remainder in cling film again) and decided to make it blue. Just a drop of colouring was all I needed and it had to be kneaded into the dough thoroughly to get an even colour. After that, I rolled it out and stamped out little flowers to my heart's content (well, until I got bored). 

All in all, I think it was a pretty successful attempt. I'll play around with it a little more and might include them in my decorations for Thursday's cupcakes. 

Make Your Own:

The recipe I followed is from 'Sensational Cupcakes' by Alisa Morov. I modified the ingredients below a little and worked with half of the quantities. 

900 grams of icing sugar, sifted

50 ml cold water

1 tablespoon powered gelatine

50 ml glucose

1 1/2 tablespoons glycerine

food colouring (optional) 

[Makes about 1 kg fondant icing]

1. Sift sugar into a large bowl (that's not metal) and make a well in the centre. 

2. Pour the water into a small saucepan and sprinkle the gelatine on top to soften for about 5 minutes. Turn on the stove and heat the gelatine, stirring until it dissolves and becomes clear. Do not let it boil. Turn off the stove and add the glucose and glycerine  and stir until it is blended. 

3. Pour the mixture into the well of sugar and mix until all of the sugar is blended (i.e. the intense kneading part). Add small amounts of icing sugar if the mixture is too sticky. 

4. Form the stiff icing into a ball and wrap tightly in cling film and place it in an airtight container. The icing works best if left to rest at room temperature for about 8 hours before using, especially if the weather is humid like it is here in Singapore. Do not refrigerate. 

There you have it! Once made, the rest is up to your imagination. Good luck!