[Cookie 090] ANZAC Biscuits

Damn, the big 9-0. So close to one hundred. But more importantly, this cookie should be acknowledged as the very first cookie I baked here in Ghana! And the very first cookie I ever baked using a gas oven! So many milestones, so many feats! I exaggerate, yes, but still I think the fact that I was able to produce mildly edible cookies using an oven that has no temperature knob and is essentially just a sealed box with a blazing fire inside of it deserves a little pat on the back. Well, when I say mildly edible I mean that the first batch I made I burned the hell out of the bottoms of (it was only thanks to my friend Ayden's nose that we realized something was going wrong in the kitchen), and the second batch baked for way too long and got overcooked and hard, though beautifully golden brown. But the cookie itself, let me just say, YES.

ANZAC Biscuits I suppose were a funny first choice cookie to make during my stay here in Africa, considering that they are a cookie that got its name from the Australian New Zealand Army Corps during WWI. Apparently, they were a popular cookie to mail to soldiers, and I can see why since they are pretty sturdy and probably won't taste bad after a few days (though mine didn't last that long). They have oats, coconut, and Lyle's Golden Syrup in them--the latter two were readily available at my local supermarket, and for a cheap price too. And let me just say: Lyle's Golden Syrup. Holy shit. This is the stuff that God drinks, I swear to you. Oh mah gaaaaaaah! I want to put this on everything I eat, from now on. Done.

The other ingredients, like flour and butter, were super expensive at the market here because I couldn't find any that weren't imported. Oh well, I guess I'll make do somehow. At least the baking soda is in the cutest container EVER!

Anyway, the recipe is pretty simple and requires that you melt your butter with the Lyle's Golden Syrup, so you don't have to set your butter out on the counter an hour early to soften up! Whipping up the dough is easy peasy, and perfect if you don't have an electric mixer on hand. Then you just scoop out balls of dough with your cookie scoop, if you have one. If not, you just roll balls of dough between your hands, and make sure to pack them tightly so that the cookie doesn't fall apart too much.

(Oh and by the way, check out the mega-kitchen that we have in my dorm here! That's only half of it, too! We have 3 oven/stoves, but only 1 has gas! I feel like I'm on a cooking show...or not at all) The next step, or actually the step before all the dough-making actually, should be to preheat your oven. Yeah no big deal, whatever, just turn the knob to 350º. Okay, I know I'm a totally newbie to this whole gas oven thing--BUT WHAT THE HELL?! You have to literally aim a flaming match underneath the bottom of your oven and pray to god that it catches fire?! And then you can't really adjust the flame (at least on ours you can't)?! And we don't have an oven thermometer yet! Blind baking!! Ahhh!! So of course, the first batch we decide that it's fine to stick our cookie sheet/roasting pan on the lowest rack, so it burns the cookies' tushies to a blackened crisp and leaves their tummies all doughy and undercooked. Then, thinking we had outsmarted the oven, we raise the sheet to the top level and the cookies bake for almost twice as long and looked perfect, but were so cooked through that they hardened up into rocks. Siiiiigh. At least it was a learning experience. Next time, the middle rack should be just right--the third bowl of porridge, if you're into metaphors or some shit.

So, these cookies are pretty delicious and easy and great and you should make them if you have a sane-person's oven. But hey, gas ovens ain't so bad. They get hot in like 3 seconds and...yeah, that's it. Okay, I'm over it! No one said it would be easy cooking on an entirely different continent, worlds away. Imma make this happen! Go go go! Welcome to a new semester of cookie baking--Awkwaaba.

ANZAC Biscuits

Makes about 3 dozen

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 cups rolled oats

2 cups sugar

1 cup desiccated coconut

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter

2 tablespoons Lyles Golden Syrup

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 cup boiling water

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper, and set aside. In a large bowl, combine flour, oats, sugar, and coconut. Set aside.

In a small saucepan over medium heat, melt butter with syrup. Dissolve baking soda in boiling water, and add to butter mixture. Stir to combine. (Be careful; if the butter is hot, it will bubble up considerably.)

Add butter mixture to dry ingredients, and stir to combine. Using a 1 1/2-inch ice-cream scoop, drop onto prepared baking sheets, about 2 inches apart (be sure to pack the scoop tightly so the mixture doesn't crumble). Flatten cookies slightly with the heel of your hand.

Bake until golden brown and firm but not hard, about 15 minutes. Transfer to wire racks to cool.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 1/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 2.5/5 (Depends on where you live, I guess)
Tastiness: 4/5
Attractiveness: 2/5
Is it worth it?: Yes! Oh man, and the dough...I could eat it for. ev. er.

{Pairings}

Drink: These would be good with milk, or nothing at all.

Song: How Hard -- James Apollo
Activity: Mastering the art of gas oven baking in a third world country!

[Cookie 089] Spiced Almond Wafers

Hey there. I'm still in Ghana. Very much so. It's really starting to set in that I'll be living here for 3.5 more months, which is so strange, but also pretty awesome! You know what goes down after my classes?? Everyone goes to this awesome cafe (if I can even call it that) that is essentially just a few tables and plastic chairs set on the side of the quiet road leading to the NYU Academic Center, and we all get a Star beer (Ghanaian!) and chill out. Uh, YES. Yeah yeah, I can hear my mom and dad groaning all the way across the Atlantic ocean; "Lizzie, do you even do any work there?! What are we paying for!?" Well, I do do work, thank you very much--it's just that Ghanaians really know how to relax. When in Rome/Accra…

Anyway, this is a cookie blog, and not a travel blog! I haven't yet made any cookies here yet, but this weekend it is SO happening, I promise. It has somehow spread around amongst the other students here that I bake cookies often, which is a bad sign because I think there might be a hype that I can't live up to! The pressure!! Anyway, there are a couple recipes that call for ingredients that are super pricy in the states--like Lyle's Golden Syrup--which are very cheap here, but other things are really expensive here, like chocolate. Basically anything imported has a huge price tag, even for American standards, which makes things a little difficult. Nah, actually, I'll just treat grocery shopping like a treasure hunt or something. Eventually I'll find all the cheap flour and sugar! Do you know they have COCONUT FLOUR here?! Awesome!! How do I use it/what do I use it in??

Okay, well this post is actually about another old cookie recipe that I baked right before I flew off to this other side of the globe. Spiced Almond Wafers! Thin, crisp, and spicy--and pretty too. The dough, surprisingly, tasted more spicy before it was baked, which is pretty odd since usually the flavors get enhanced after baking, and after having a day to set in. These cookies ended up tasting nice, but nothing shockingly flavorful or anything. I also wished they were a little thinner, like the pictures, but maybe I just didn't slice the dough thin enough. Oh hey! Idea! Maybe you could use a cooking mandolin to slice the dough evenly! Would that work??

The recipe itself, however, is a little more interesting than most of her recipes. Whipping up the dough is the same as usual, but once you've made it you stick it into some mini bread loaf tins so that the dough freezes into a brick shape. I didn't have any mini loaf pans, so I just used regular sized ones and didn't fill them up bigger than I wanted the dimensions of the cookies to be.

Once you freeze the dough for a while, you slice off cookies and decorate them with almond slices. It can get a little tedious, but if you've got some jams playin' it shouldn't take you too long. And the end result is pretty dang adorable, and I can't deny an adorable cookie. Some people can't deny adorable children--I can! But an adorable cookie, that's another matter.

As you can see, the cookie travels well and is perfect for picnics too! A good snacking cookie, nothing all that heavy or dense, so you can bring them to a party and people won't complain that you're trying to fatten them up (a problem, I must admit, I have encountered a couple of times).

So, in conclusion, these cookies are cute and people will like the way they look and most will like the way they taste. They will probably fall in the middle of my rankings of best cookies, but they ain't bad!

Ciao puppies

xx

Spiced Almond Wafers

Makes about 6 dozen (it's true!!)

Ingredients

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature

1 1/2 cups packed dark-brown sugar

2 large eggs

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 cup sliced blanched almonds

Directions

Line 2 mini loaf pans with plastic wrap.

Whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt. Beat butter and sugar with a mixer on medium speed for 4 minutes. Reduce speed to low. Add eggs and spices. Beat in flour mixture in 3 additions.

Press cookie dough into pans, and cover tightly with plastic wrap. Freeze for 1 1/2 hours (or up to 1 month).

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Remove dough from 1 pan. Let soften slightly. Cut eight 1/8-inch-thick slices with a sharp knife. Cover remaining dough, and freeze in pan until ready to slice and bake.

Place slices 1 1/2 inches apart on a cookie sheet lined with a nonstick baking mat. Top each with 2 to 3 almond slices. Freeze until firm, 5 minutes. Bake until dark golden brown, 10 minutes. Let cool on sheet on a wire rack. Repeat.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 3.5/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 4/5
Tastiness: 3/5
Attractiveness: 4/5
Is it worth it?: Yeah sure, why not

{Pairings}

Drink: Aw, a nice light wine, if you wanna get fancy romantic.

Song: Skinny Love -- Bon Iver
Activity: A picnic, complete with cherries, a baguette, and kettle corn. And that wine. Trust me when I say that can't be beat...

[Cookie 088] Wholemeal Almond Biscuits

HELLO! Wo ho te sen? I am writing from Accra, Ghana right this instant! I can't believe I've only been here 1 week, because it feels like 1 month. The past week was more than hectic, being that it was orientation week, so we didn't have a moment to breathe. I've gone to lectures, learned a little bit of Twi (the language spoken here), gone shopping (I've only just begun...), watched some traditional African drumming and dancing, went to an afrobeat concert, went to the beach, seen the local universities, and just had my first class (African Philosophical Thought) today. It's hot and humid, but not too bad. And the food...

The food.

Is so.

Good.

I think I can get used to this. Jollof rice, yum yum, banku, yum yum, fufu (haven't had it yet, but I can't wait), and plantains!! And get this: they sell shots of alcohol in packets like ketchup. Uh, yes. I got some/a lot. Cane Spirit! Coffee-flavored Whiskey! Gin! Haven't tried that coffee or cane stuff yet, but you just wait. I'll report back. Oh, and listen to this great idea that one of my esteemed colleagues came up with: buy a coconut on the street, pour a packet of gin into the coconut water, and then stick in a straw and DONE. After-school special. Ah, yes, I could so get used to this.

One thing that will make this whole blog thing a little difficult is the fact that the internet connection here is hardly adequate. Whatever--I'll do something else, like READ. Whoa. Or maybe draw. I think it will be good for me, build character. I'm too dependent on this computer here. Maybe I'll start basket weaving, which I'm going to be learning in one of my art classes (!!!!).

This huge culture shock and overwhelming week of change makes writing this post a little weird. Thinking about these cookies, and what I was doing during the time I made them, seems like eons (and miles) ago. I'd usually try to make my initial anecdote somehow relate to the cookie in question, but I don't think I can do it this time. These Wholemeal Almond Biscuits just don't scream Ghana at all. Well, they are sort of like Hobnobs, which are these amazing cookies that probably aren't from Ghana only, but still--SO good. But more than that, to me they scream English tea time, so maybe you could make the whole British colonization connection, but I really don't feel like getting into that....at all.

So let's just talk straight about these cookies. They are very subtle in flavor, not sweet at all really. They do have a really nice cinnamon undertone, though, along with the flavor of almonds and whole wheat flavor, which I really loved. Their name is a really accurate description of what kind of cookie you get--a biscuit, wheaty and nutty. They are hearty and great with tea, or maybe with a bit of whipped cream/clotted cream and some berries for a fancy tea-time treat.

Once again, the recipe has you make your own almond meal, and this time I actually did that instead of substituting store bought almond meal. Good choice! The recipe worked perfectly and the toasted almonds gave a great flavor to the dough. If you want, you could probably add nutmeg or some other spice, but I thought the cinnamon was just perfect.

Okay, so a great tea cookie. I think I can make a feeble connection to Ghana with this one: THEY DON'T DRINK REAL COFFEE HERE. Or at least, I've had trouble ordering anything other than Nescafe instant coffee. This makes me majorly sad. I bought some ground coffee that's made in Togo, which is awesome in theory, but doesn't taste really that great. But I'm a bit of a snob about coffee, so don't listen to me.

Aaanyway, I think that's all I've got to say about these. You should make them. Serve them with iced tea, since it's way too hot to think about boiling water in the northern hemisphere. Or hey, you could maybe make ice cream sandwiches with these--might get a bit messy though.

I actually ate mine with a cup of Tazo Honeybush tea and a small cup of cold Tapioca pudding that my dad made the night before, and it was a perfect afternoon dessert (new meal! new meal!). The tapioca might have been a little heavy to have with an already heavy cookie, but the Honeybush tea was just right--nice and light, but with a strong enough floral flavor to really be quite refreshing.

Okay, I'm going to go now. I have class soon. Aight. Bye bye. Until next time (soon I hope!)

Wholemeal Almond Biscuits

Ingredients

1 cup blanched whole almonds, toasted

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup all-purpose flour, plus more for work surface

1/3 cup packed light-brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon coarse salt

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cold, cut into pieces

2 tablespoons ice water, plus more if needed

Directions

Pulse almonds in a food processor until coarsely ground. Add flours, sugar, salt, and cinnamon, and pulse to combine. Add butter, and pulse until mixture resembles coarse meal. With machine running, pour in enough water until dough just starts to come together on the sides of the bowl. Shape dough into a ball, and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate until cold and slightly firm, no longer than 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Roll out dough on a lightly floured work surface to an 11-inch round just more than 1/4 inch thick. Cut out 3-inch circles. Carefully gather scraps of dough, reroll, and cut out remaining biscuits. Space 1 1/2 inches apart on baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Bake cookies until edges are golden brown, about 30 minutes. Let cool on baking sheets on wire racks. Cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature up to 5 days.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 2/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 4/5
Tastiness: 4/5
Attractiveness: 3/5
Is it worth it?: Yes!

{Pairings}

Drink: Tazo Honeybush tea, or any other Rooibos/Redbush tea

Song: That's Where It's At -- Sam Cookie (!)
Activity: Afternoon tea, whatever country you live in. I think that activity should really transcend geography and country borders. Teatime for all!

[Cookie 087] Chocolate-Ginger Leaves and Acorns

Well, well, I ain't gone yet. Technically I am, but at the very moment I'm enjoying a relaxing, peaceful stay at the JFK airport...for eight hours. Eight hour layover. I love traveling. Turns out that the student-discount website that I bought my tickets from neglected to inform me that my flight number was changed to a flight leaving an hour later than I had expected, thus giving me eight hours to hang out in the airport. If I had known sooner, I would have taken a later flight to JFK from LAX, and not had to wake up at 3:30 in the morning, but that wouldn't have been any fun now would it?

Okay, okay, it's not so bad. It could be going the other way--me missing my flight by eight hours. And hell, I'm going to AFRICA so I guess I shouldn't really be complaining. I'm doing what I can to pass the time (I bought wifi access for the day, which is how I'm writing this duhhh), and I ate at one of those ridiculous sit-down "restaurants" in the airport, the food at which was thoroughly mediocre. Maybe after this I'll watch some episodes of The Daily Show or Community, or work on my portfolio website. Oh the things I can get done! All while sitting in this vomit-colored leather chair by a window overlooking a massive jumbo British Airways jet. Productivity AND ambiance!

So let's talk about these cookies that I made like 6 weeks ago (whoops, lazy blogging--I couldn't care less). These Chocolate-Ginger Leaves and Acorns really didn't seem like the right cookie to make in July, but I had the ingredients hangin' around--minus the molasses, which warranted a quick trip to Pavilions. The recipe is very simple, even for this cookbook, and satisfied my urge to bake something. However, the resultant cookie wasn't really anything to write home about. It tastes nice, but nothing unusual. And as you can see, I didn't really feel like going out and buying leaf- and acorn-shaped cookie cutters, so I made cats, hearts, and misshapen free-form circle things!

I bet I'm not alone when I say I hate rerolling scraps of dough a million times for cookie-cutter recipes, right? So after a while I either just give up and eat the rest of the dough (NO SHAME!!!) or I roll the dough into balls and flatten them with a fork. Yeah, yeah, they don't cook the same way as the thin cookie-cutter cookies, but this way I get a few under-baked ones, which I love. Everyone's happy, especially me.

So, I guess that's all I have to say about these. I wish I had some epic, hilarious, and tragic story to tell that's related to making these, just so I could pass some more time here at Gate 6 in Terminal 7, but I don't. I guess it's time for me to start playing Farmville again...kidding!! Sort of.

Chocolate-Ginger Acorns

Makes 4 dozen

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for work surface

1/2 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon coarse salt

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

3/4 cup packed dark-brown sugar

1 large egg

1/2 cup unsulfured molasses

1 tablespoon peeled, grated fresh ginger

Fine sanding sugar, for sprinkling

Directions

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, spices, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in medium bowl.

Put butter and brown sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add egg, molasses, and grated ginger; mix until combined. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture; mix until just combined.

Halve dough; shape into disks. Wrap each disk in plastic; refrigerate until cold, about 1 hour. Working with 1 disk at a time, roll out dough on a lightly floured surface to 1/4-inch thick. (If dough becomes too soft at any time, freeze until firm.) Cut out shapes with 3-inch acorn- or leaf-shaped cookie cutters; space 1 inch apart on baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Refrigerate until firm, about 20 minutes.

Score designs with a paring knife; sprinkle with sanding sugar. Bake, rotating sheets halfway through, until firm, 11 to 13 minutes. Cool on sheets on wire racks. Store cookies in an airtight container at room temperature up to 5 days.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 2/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 4/5
Tastiness: 3.5/5
Attractiveness: 4/5
Is it worth it?: Yeah, I guess. I am thoroughly indifferent about these.

{Pairings}

Drink: Because they are pretty subtle in flavor, I wouldn't drink anything with these, per se.

Song: Who Knows Who Cares -- Local Natives
Activity: I could see serving these at an autumn party--a Harvest Party!! Ooh someone please do that! I'm so sad I'm going to miss fall, my favorite season...but I just don't think the leaves are going to change in Ghana all that much.

[Cookie 086] Baci di Dama

Oh guys, it's taking every ounce of strength in me to not turn this post into a sob story about the best summer ever coming to a close, but I will keep my strength. It is difficult and a little painful. Same goes for these cookies--Baci di Dama. Baci di Dama is italian for "lady's kisses," how apt. Though, let's get real: they look a little bit like poops. Haha sorry, sorry...is anyone still reading this? Whatever, let's just think of them as the cookie sisters to Hershey's kisses. Unfortunately, the baked incarnation of this phrase is far more tedious and frustrating than actual lady's kisses, but what can you do.

Traditionally, Baci di Dama are made with hazelnuts I believe, but this recipe uses almonds. Once again I used almond meal instead of almonds that I ground up myself, and this time I think I should have ground them myself. The dough was a little too thick, which in part might have been because of how I whipped the egg whites, but also because the almond meal I was using is rather coarse.

Here's a question for all you meringue pros: after whipping the egg whites to stiff, glossy peaks, whenever I add the sugar, the mixture gets very sticky, heavy, and gunky. And as a result, I think my cookies aren't as light and airy as they could be. Remember the Hazelnut Cookies of yore? Same problem. I'd love any advice you guys have to give! Granted, this recipe does specifically state that the batter should be thick and sticky, but I still think I could get the cookies to be a tad lighter in the end.

Alright, so after you make the dough, you pipe it out into a bunch of kisses onto your cookie sheet and baked them. Tedious tedious tedious. But not so bad. Here's the bigger issue: Martha tells you to make the kisses have a little mound, or peak, at the top (like a Hershey's kiss, sorta), but that makes the whole procedure that follows quite difficult. You see, you make this ganache and are supposed to sandwich it between two cookies, but with the peaks--kisses, if you will--it becomes nearly impossible to stand them up in a way that will let the ganache set. If you lay them sideways, the top cookie slides off and the ganache oozes everywhere into a mess. So I tried to wedge the peaks of the cookies between the grates on my cooling rack, but it still sucked. And plus, the ganache really refuses to set unless you refrigerate the cookies, which doesn't really help their texture much in the long run. Not impressed, Martha.

So I managed to make a million or so of these cookies and only had three mental breakdowns in the process. I wouldn't really mind though if the cookies were totally delicious in the end, but they weren't. They just tasted "meh." I'm sure you can buy some really fantastic Baci di Dama in Little Italy or at some Italian bakery somewhere, but this recipe isn't worth all the effort it requires.

I'll just tell it to you straight: I wouldn't recommend making these cookies. They don't really look that gorgeous when complete (even in the picture in the book), they don't really taste that great, and therefore they aren't really worth spending an entire afternoon swearing and sweating. Just hand out some real kisses instead--they'll be appreciated more, by both the receiver and the giver.

xoxo

Baci di Dama

Makes about 1 1/2 dozen (but I got way way more)

Ingredients

Cookies

2 large egg whites

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder, sifted

6 1/4 ounces (1 1/2 cups) medium-finely ground blanched almonds

• Filling

1/2 teaspoon solid vegetable shortening

4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, melted

Directions

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment.

Make cookies: Place egg whites in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Beat on high until egg whites form stiff peaks. Add the sugar slowly; continue beating until egg whites are very thick, 2 to 3 minutes. Beat in cocoa until combined. Stir in almonds; mix until completely blended. Batter should be quite thick and sticky.

Transfer to a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2 inch round tip (such as Ateco #806). Pipe teaspoon-size, peaked mounds onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper, spacing about 2 inches apart.

Bake until slightly cracked, 15 to 17 minutes, rotating sheets halfway through. Let cool on sheets several minutes, then transfer to a rack to cool completely.

Making filling: In a small bowl, combine shortening and melted chocolate. Spoon about 1/2 teaspoon of chocolate onto flat side of cookie; place another cookie on top. Press together gently so chocolate oozes out slightly. Return cookie to wire rack to set; repeat with remaining cookies. Cookies can be stored between layers of parchment in an airtight container at room temperature up to 3 days.

****

{End Results}
Baking Difficultly: 4.5/5
Ingredient Accessibility: 4/5
Tastiness: 2/5
Attractiveness: 3/5
Is it worth it?: No.

{Pairings}

Drink: I think these would go nicely with an espresso, something small to go with their size.

Song: I Learned the Hard Way -- Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings Probably the best song that's come out this year.
Activity: Skip baking these and go give out some of your own lady kisses.