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Its Bake - athon !! For some reason, I need to have a baked cookie, cake or a brownie lingering around in my kitchen. Once the Peanut butter cookies got over at home, I needed something else.. Yes Its a confession here !


Just like V - my boy , his mama also needs something delicious and a treat.These cookies are a result of this craving ;) I admit. Milk and some cookies ! Gobble Gobble.. One for every day. One or may be two after school everday. A quicky search on the internet, led me to this no fail cookie recipe. Find the link here.


While I  was making the dough for this cookies, I had baked the my instant fairy cupcakes for Tea and Brownies for the week!! Isnt it a Bake -a-thon home , now! The recipe for my own invented Brownie recipe is to follow in the coming posts.When this post gets live in my blog, I will be holidaying in India with friends and families. Having no intention to keep my dear readers, friends and family to think I have vanished again , this post will cover for all my absence.


This recipe also had a few substitutions to suit the available ingredients. I have replaced the muscovoda sugar with another portion of granulated sugar.Also just used about 100 g of Chocolate chips, when the recipe called for 200g. Also the cookie dough requires no chilling, as per the original recipe.

CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES Prep Time: 10 minutes Chilling Time : 1 hour+ Baking Time : 9 minutes each batch Yields: 35-38 cookies INGREDIENTS: 225g Plain Flour 160g Granulated Sugar 150g Unsalted Butter 2 Large Eggs 2 tsp Vanilla Essence ½  tsp Bicarbonate Soda 100g Chocolate chips DIRECTIONS:   Whisk the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy using a handheld electric mixer. Add the egg, beating it well, scrapping the sides until it’s all clean.  Reduce the speed to low and beat in vanilla extract, until well incorporated.  Stir in the flour, bicarbonate of soda and mix until smooth dough is formed. Mix the chocolate into the dough until evenly mixed. Roll the dough into a log, wrap it in a cling film and chill it for an hour+ until firm.  Preheat the oven to 190C/ fan assisted oven to 170 F, gas mark 3. Line 2 baking trays with a greaseproof sheets Get the dough log from the fridge and cut them into equal pieces. Arrange 6 equal amount of the cookie dough on the prepared baking tray. Make sure to space the cookies apart , allowing the cookies to spread whilst baking. Bake in the preheated oven for 9 minutes until the edges start to turn golden brown. Leave the cookies to cool in the tray for another 10 minutes, before turning them out on a wire rack to cool completely. The cookies turned out to be soft and chewy! NOTES: The recipe did not call for chilling the dough. Since I have had disasters with the dough going really flat and not getting the desired result, I have chilled the dough. You could cut the cookie dough log into equal sizes and place them as it is, or roll them in the middle of your palm and place them on the prepared tray.

 Love the color , Love the simplicity of its taste , Love it for the way it is !  The Pound Cake.
2 weeks ago , we were invited to a friends place for a dinner to celebrate their newest arrival's 3rd month Birthday... Until the kids turn 1 , we just cherish every moment and love to celebrate any milestone.
So decided to make this special ones birthday a little more spl with a Pound Cake and some  Condensed Milk Cookies.
They loved it ... Infact half was over in a day at home & rest of it , the baby's mother finished it the next day. :) She anyways doesnt have to worry about calories and fat  ,coz she is still feeding .




Isnt it delicious.. Well Well.., I have no intentions in taking any credit for this Pound Cake recipe . I got the recipe from here. 



CONDENSED MILK BISCUITS

I had about 1/2 can of condensed milk left over from the Cake .. and was wondering wot to do.. Thats when this post on chocolate-hearts from Sushma's blog popped up.
Just did a little a variation by not adding nuts & used dark chocolate chips instead of milk ones.



KITCHEN NOTES :
The cake was moist n fresh for 4 days when stored in an airtight container.
I got a feedback from neighbour granny that  the biscuits were fresh and delicious.. even after 2 days:)

Cheers

I see a little twinke, a little sparke in her eyes !! The sky is dark and clear , cold and frosty as it should be in November . Boom !! Hears ZZZ ! As the curtain is gently slided , you see colorful sparks in the sky . Curiously looking , My little pumpkin S starts to run all around the house and in excitement. Dada lifts her , strokes her back, sliding her soft locks off her face and tells her its Patas ( fireworks in tamil) . She slowly grasped her newly learned word.


Ever after that whenever she heard a Boom , Bang , Bong her eyes keenly look for the loud chromatic display in the dark sky. Just as the guy fawkes day celebration went past , here in UK , we had an exemplary fireworks display in a local park. Sitting up, cosily in our bedroom, sungged in our fleece jumpers and heater s on , we witnessed a 30 minutes picturesque prismatic exhibit . An extra hug , An extra kiss and more cuddles is what we got for this grandeur celebration . The kids in the neighbour hood were already woeing as this beauty they were all witnessing was drawing to closure..


How I wish , our little kids get to be a part of the traditional Diwali celebration like we used in our childood. They would barely crave nor get high stungon hearing a #Boom # Bang !!
As parents, sometimes we feel , we are depriving our lil ones of their culture and heritage sitting afar.. Something definitely needs to be done to bridge this gap... we want them to experience, a typical celebration like we all did since childhood. A stride that needs some hard work and a lot of thinking before the next celebration , next year !


This recipe of Peanut Butter Cookies comes from my favourite book the hummingbird bakery cookbook, and the logic for making them has got nothing to do with Diwali or with celebration mood . Lol . But this is here, because of my new essential kitchen gadget, my hand mixer. I have been using my muscle power and a simple whisk in the last 6 months of my baking . Coming to the recipe, the must ingredient was crunchy peanut butter  and I have used a Skipp Smooth Peanut Butter. Kids at home do not relish any abnormal texture on their tongue, so things got be smooth :) The instructions also called for a portion of light brown sugar but I have just used some caster sugar. Its not in my dictionary to go buy ingredients to make a delight. Everythings has to be home, reachable !!My personal mantra is to make things with readily available ingredients. SO invention it is !!

PEANUT BUTTER COOKIES Prep Time: 10 minutes Freezing Time : 1 hour+ Baking Time : 14 minutes each batch Yields: 25-28 cookies INGREDIENTS: 170g Plain Flour 200g Caster Sugar 112g Unsalted Butter 1 Large Egg 120g Smooth Peanut Butter 1/2 tsp Vanilla Essence 1 ¼ tsp Bicarbonate Soda 40g Dark Chocolate ,roughly chopped DIRECTIONS: Whisk the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy using a handheld electric mixer. Add the egg, beating it well, scrapping the sides until it’s all clean.  Reduce the speed to low and beat in vanilla extract, peanut butter until well incorporated.  Stir in the flour, bicarbonate of soda and mix until smooth dough is formed. Mix the chocolate into the dough until evenly mixed. Roll the dough into a log, wrap it in a cling film and chill it for an hour+ until firm. Preheat the fan assisted oven to 170 F, gas mark 3. Line 4 baking trays with a greaseproof sheets Get the dough log from the fridge and cut them into equal pieces. Arrange 6 equal amount of the cookie dough on the prepared baking tray. Make sure to space the cookies apart , allowing the cookies to spread whilst baking. Bake in the preheated oven for 14 minutes until the edges start to turn golden brown. Leave the cookies to cool in the tray for another 10 minutes, before turning them out on a wire rack to cool completely. The cookies turned out to be soft and crunchy! NOTES: The recipe did not call for chilling the dough. Since I have had disasters with the dough going really flat and not getting the desired result, I have chilled the dough. You could cut the cookie dough log into equal sizes and place them as it is, or roll them in the middle of your palm and place them on the prepared tray. Incase you have missed reading all my banausic scribbling, there are few replacements I have done to the orginal recipe in the book. I have used Smooth Peanut Butter instead of Crunchy Peanut Butter and only used caster sugar instead of a combination of light brown sugar and caster sugar as in the book.

For Printed Version click here



INGREDIENTS:

Plain Flour / Maida	2 Cups
Salt	A Pinch ( I have not added in my cookies)
Egg	1 No
Sugar	3/4th Cup
Butter	125 gm
Baking Powder	2 Tsp
Vanilla Essence	3/4th Tsp

DIRECTIONS:

• Cream butter and sugar together , then add Egg  & give it a good blend. The recipe called for 1/2 Cup of Sugar but I have increased it to 3/4th Cup.. Taste is just right for us.
• Tip in Flour , Salt and Baking powder into a different bowl and mix well.
• Combine the flour mix along with the butter mix and blend until the dough ball forms. Wrap this dough ball in a cling film and chill it for atleast 1 hour until it gets firm. This dough is really soft to handle and I could not make any shapes . Hence chilled the dough.
•  Once the dough is firm, remove it from the cling film and make shapes of your choice. I have prepared the traditional round balls roughly 1" and flattened them with my palm. Also did the star shapes to attract lil V. Make sure the cookies are slightly thick and not very flat and it willl get crisp v fast.Grease the baking sheet and arrange the cookies in line. Refrigerate for another 10-15 minutes before placing them into the oven. Check if the cookies are a bit firm,only then the shape will be retained.
• Preheat the oven to 180 C . Place the baking sheet in the oven and bake for 10-12 minutes or until it slightly turns brown.Allow it cool for 15 minutes...  ( Tis a secret that we enjoyed it warm too ) .This proportion together yields roughly 25 of them !
  
•  These butter cookies are just delicious ..  crunchy and melting in your mouth !!

Eggless Indeed !!! My second treat for my family in India was Chocolate Chip Cookies. This got to be a bit chewy  .... Some of them were chewy... and some were crispy.. Its entirely to do with the time we bake :)

My grandpa made it a point to ring me after he had them with his evening Filter Coffee... coz he really cherished and thoroughly enjoyed the taste.. and more over it was his darling grand daughter who had made it!!!

My standard egg replacer is Yogurt.. Very easy to use and we are bound to get it right in the first attempt. My brother picked up Ener-G  , the egg replacer powder.. from US.. Definitely my future try's will have them instead of yogurt!!!



INGREDIENTS:

Plain Flour	2 1/4 Cups
White Sugar	3/4 Cup
Brown Sugar	3/4 Cup
Vanilla Extract	1 Tsp
Unsalted Butter	1 Cup
Baking Soda	1 Tsp
Low fat Yogurt	1/2 Cup
Dark Chocolate Chips	1 Cup

Variations:

Chopped Walnuts	Handful
Coco Powder	1 Tsp

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 200 C. Grease the baking tin

• Combine all the dry Ingredients except sugar & mix well in a bowl and set aside.
• In a small bowl ,Combine the butter & sugar  togetherand whisk until smooth . Add in Vanilla extract and yogurt and whisk well.
• Incorporate dry ingredients all at once into the wet Ingredients and blend well. Refrigerate the dough if it is very soft.
• Add Chocolate Chips to the whole dough and knead well.
• Make the dough into 3 parts...
•   leave one bit of the dough as it is
•   onto the 2 nd part add in the walnut bits 
•  to the 3rd part add the coco powder and make it the chocolate flavoured choco chip cookies.
• Using a dry spoon , drop 1 tspoonful from each dough on the greased baking sheet .
• Bake the cookies for about 15 minutes or until slightly brown. Allow it to cool on a  wire rack.
• This measurement will yield about 40 cookies. 

Cheers

This series of Food Photography is something that I look forward to share with you. A process of continuous learning that I do through the months.. apart from the well styled end products. This month is all about some colourful baby peppers, chayote , vegetable crate and some cookies..
Styling / Set up in this set of images is slightly different from my usual ones.. and I ended up discovering some new techniques and cheats in my work.. Delightful moments this month!!

Over the weekend , we went to Tesco's for grocery shopping in half filled stomach. And we ended up picking up Cookie tins , Crisps ,Bars & so on. One among them was a tin of Danish Cookies.. Yummy Yummy. Reading through the ingredients of the cookies , I was struck with an idea.. Why not try making them at home?? My first attempt at Biscuits... & not bad at all. Its quite simple & takes under 40 minutes overall.



Ingredients:

1. 75gm self-rising flour
2. 75gm plain flour
3. 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
4. 70gm butter
5. 50gm sugar.I have used light brown soft sugar
6. 1 egg beaten

Directions:

1. PreSet oven at 160 degrees C .

2. In the mean while ,take a large bowl & sift flours and cinnamon together.
   In a separate bowl, mix butter and sugar until smooth.Now add egg and mix them well using a hand blender or a egg beater .




3. Stir in the dry ingredients(flour -cinnamon mix) and mix into firm dough using hand. Knead until a soft dough is obtained . Approximately roll to 4-5mm thickness & Cut into shapes of choice. Now place them on a greased ovenproof tray. I sprayed a bit of sunflower oil to coat the tray.



 



4. Bake in the preheated oven until light golden colour, about 15 mins. Now shift it to a cool rack for 5 min & allow the buiscuit to harden.


5. Light Sugary Cinnamon biscuits are just in time to be served with tea.

Inspired from All receipes

havent written much in last 2 months.. But definitely thr is a want for flow... huhu.....lets get  started up Gal!!

Plain Flour/ All purpose Flour/ Maida	1.5 Cups
Corn Flour	1/2 Cup
Unsalted Butter	1 Cup
Icing Sugar	1/2 Cup
Vanilla Extract	1 Tsp
Cling Film	For Rolling

• Whisk the plain flour , corn flour & sugar together in a bowl and keep it aside.
• Beat the butter and vanilla extract until soft and creamy. Now slowly incorporate the butter mix into the flour and whisk until just incorporated. 
• Gently flatten the dough and cover it in cling film and refrigerate for atleast 1-1.5 hours. Once the dough is firm remove it from the refrigerator and make cookies of desired shape. 
• I have taken  roughly 1" balls and have gently flattened  them using the back of a fork.
• Grease the baking sheet and arrange the cookies in line. Refrigerate for another 10-15 minutes before placing them into the oven. Make sure the cookies are a bit firm . Only then the shape will be retained.
• Preheat the oven to 175 C . Place the baking sheet in the oven and bake for 10-12 minutes or until it slightly turns brown.  Allow them to cool down before serving for tea. 
• This preparation roughly yields 22-24 cookies. These cookies stay fresh for roughly 3 weeks if  kept in an airtight container.