Cheesy Feet

Nigella made hers (& therefore named hers) using Feet cutters.  I used a Crocodile cutter and a Kangaroo one I have.  They are so easy to make and very tasty indeed.  (Monet loves them!)  I will be making batches more in times to come...

*Taken from Nigella Lawson's 'Feast', pg 253, published 2004*

Ingredients

100gm Cheddar cheese, grated

25gm soft butter

50gm plain flour

1/4 tsp baking powder

Method

Preheat the oven to gas mark 6/200C.

Put all of the ingredients into a food processor and blitz until the dough comes together.  Just be patient; it will happen, I promise you.  Form into a fat disc, wrap in clingfilm and let it rest in the fridge for 15 minutes.

Roll out the dough on a floury surface to roughly 3mm in thickness, and cut out your feet with your cutters.  You can keep re-rolling this dough and cutting out feet until it is all used up.

Put them on to a lined baking tray sheet and cook in the oven for 10-12 minutes (depending on size).  The biscuits will continue to crisp up as they cool on a rack, so take them out when they're still a little soft in the middle.

Marshmallow Biscuits (aka Wagon Wheels)

Lyndon spotted this recipe on 'The Age' website recipe page and seeing that Wagon Wheels are Lyndon's favourite biscuits, I made them today.  

They are a bit fiddly to make but I think they are worth it.  I made mini ones and a few bigger ones.  I also used milk chocolate instead of dark chocolate.  When using the jam, I put the amount into a small zip-bag and snipped off a little bit of the corner to use as a bag to pipe it rather than spooning it.  

Ingredients

60g butter

100g (1/2 cup) firmly packed brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla essence

225g (1 1/2 cups) plain flour, sifted

110g (1/2 cup) caster sugar

1/2 cup water

3/4 tbs gelatine powder

1 tsp vanilla essence

8 tsp raspberry jam

150g dark chocolate, chopped and melted

Method

Pre-heat the oven to 160C (fan forced)

For the biscuits

Place butter and brown sugar in a large (I used small) bowl and beat with an electric beater until smooth.  Add the egg and vanilla and mix well.  Fold in the sifted flour.  Place mixture onto a lightly floured surface and roll out to a 5mm thickness.  Cut out 16 circles with a 6cm round biscuit cutter and place on a lightly greased oven tray.  Bake for 10-12 minutes or until golden brown.  Cool on trays.

For the marshmallows

Combine the caster sugar and water in a small saucepan , then sprinkle gelatine powder into the mix.  Stir over low heat until sugar and gelatine dissolve.  Bring to the boil, stirring and simmer for 4-5 minutes.  Remove from heat and cool.  When almost cold, pour mixture into a bowl, add vanilla and beat with an electric mixer for 3-4  minutes (took really about 8-10 minutes), until mixture is very thick. 

To assemble

Spoon marshmallow mixture into a piping bag fitted with a 1cm plain tube and pipe marshmallow around the edge of half the biscuits.  Spoon a little jam into the center of the marshmallow and top with the remaining biscuits, pressing gently.  Rest biscuits in the fridge for about 15 minutes until marshmallow is firm then place on a cake rack and spread over melted chocolate.

Store in an airtight container.

 

Makes 8

Classic Chocolate Chip Cookies

If you are ready for a sugar rush (I know, there is a lot of sugar in these!), then these biscuits are for you. When you have mixed the ingredients all together and you have placed teaspoonfuls onto a baking tray, do not flatten the biscuits out. They will naturally flatten whilst baking. The recipe states that it makes 30 but I got more like 40.

In the above photo, the middle cookies were baked for about 2 minutes less than the others either side of them.

*Taken from the back of packet of Cadbury Milk Chop Chips 230g pack*

Ingredients

125g butter

1 cup soft brown sugar

3/4 cup caster sugar

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 egg

1 1/2 cups Self-Raising flour

3/4 cup Milk Chocolate Chips

Method

Preheat oven to 160C.

Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Mix in the vanilla essence and egg. Stir in the flour until combined. Add the Choc Chips, mix.

Place teaspoons of mixture on greased baking trays and bake in moderate oven for 10-15 minutes.

Makes 30

Anzac Biscuits

These biscuits were made by the Australian mothers/sisters/wives of the 'diggers' of WW1, and sent over to them. Hence the name, Anzac Biscuits. They keep really well and are very delicious. For a cruncher biscuit, bake for a few minutes longer...

Ingredients

1 cup rolled oats

1 cup plain flour, sifted

1 cup caster sugar

1 cup desiccated coconut

125 g butter, chopped

1 tbs golden syrup

2 tbs boiling water

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

Method

Preheat oven to moderately slow, 160C. Lightly grease (or line) 4 baking trays.

In a medium bowl, combine rolled oats, flour, sugar and coconut.

Combine the butter and golden syrup in a small pan. Stir over low heat for 2-3 minutes, until melted.

Combine water and soda in a small jug. Stir into warm butter mixture. Pour mixture into dry ingredients. Mix well.

Roll rounded teaspoons of mixture into balls. Arrange on prepared trays, leaving a space between each to allow for spreading. Press lightly to flatten.

Bake for around 15 minutes or until golden. Stand 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool.

makes approx. 36

Chocolate Mint Carnival Bars

It is another wet and rainy day here in Cairns so Monet decided I should bake something. I thought I would give this recipe a try, considering I actually had everything in my pantry.. In the book it states that they are like a biscuit but I think they are very much like a Brownie. Delicious, especially when still a little warm...

*Taken from Philippa Vanstone's '500 Cookies'*

Ingredients
75g (3 oz) unsalted butter, softened
100g (3 1/2 oz) light brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp peppermint essence
190 g (6 1/2 oz) plain flour
2 tbs dutch process cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking powder
100g (3 1/2 oz) choc chips (I used white)

Method
Pre-heat oven to 175C/350F/Gas Mark 4. Line a 23cm square tin.

Beat the butter and sugar, then add the egg and peppermint essence. Sift the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder and beat into mixture. Stir in the chocolate chips.

Press the mixture into the tin and bake for 20 to 25 minutes until golden brown. Cool in the tin and then cut into squares.

Store in an airtight container for five to seven days.

Yo-Yo Biscuits

As a child I loved Yo-Yo biscuits. They were quick and easy to make and remind me of cold, rainy Saturday afternoons. Very easy to make and guaranteed you won't stop at eating just one. A sure-fired winner!

Ingredients
3/4 cup Self Raising flour
1/3 cup Custard Powder
1/3 cup icing sugar
1/2 cup softened butter

Method
Preheat oven to 180C. Line or grease a baking tray.

Cream butter and icing sugar and gradually add sifted flour and icing sugar, mixing to a stiff dough using wooden spoon. Roll into small balls. Press with a fork dipped in flour for 10-15 minutes until just golden. Bake for 12-15 minutes, until golden. (I overcooked these ones a little)

Makes approx. 20

These can be served individually like this or can be paired together with a quick mixture of icing sugar and butter creamed together...

Butter Cut-Out Biscuits

Monet loves to help me bake, so I decided to make up a batch of these buttery cookies. Quick and easy to make and the dough freezes wonderfully. Half of this mixture is now wrapped in clingfilm and freezing away until a rainy day... Monet got a collection of cookie cutters from us for Christmas, so making this was an excuse for Monet to tryout her new cutters. Lots of fun, well it would have been a lot of fun if Monet didn't 'crack it' halfway through and walked away...

*Taken from Nigella Lawson's 'How To Be A Domestic Goddess'*

Ingredients
175g soft unsalted butter
200g caster sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
400g plain flour plus more if needed
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
300g icing sugar sieved and food colouring

Method
Preheat the oven to 180C/gas mark 4.

Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and moving towards moussiness, then beat in the eggs and vanilla. In another bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the butter eggs and mix gently but surely. If you think the finished mixture is too sticky to be rolled out, (chances are it will be), add more flour, but do so sparingly as too much will make the dough tough.

Halve the dough, form into fat discs, wrap each half in clingfilm and rest in the fridge for at least an hour.

Sprinkle a suitable surface with flour, place a disc of dough on it (not taking out the other half until you are finished with the first) and sprinkle a little more flour on top of that. Roll it out to a thickness of about 1/2 cm. Cut into shapes, dipping the cutter into flour as you go, and place the biscuits a little apart on lined baking trays.

Bake for 8-12 minutes, until they are lightly golden around the edges. Cool on rack.

To make the icing, put a couple of tablespoons of just-not-boiling water into a large bowl, add the sieved sugar and mix together, adding more water as you need to form a thick paste. Colour as desired and decorate biscuits...

(I divided the icing mixture into little zip-closing plastic bags, coloured the icing, closed bags up, snipped a little corner off the bag and used like a piping bag. Very little mess this way.)

Makes 50-60

Choc Oatmeal Cookies

I got this recipe from my sis-in-law, Sarah (again) and it is a big hit in this household. Not that Lyndon eats biscuits but Monet and I surely can. It is a very easy recipe and Monet likes to get involved with this one. The mixture, before it is cooked, is scrumptious so maybe keep the kids away before baking!!

*Taken from a Bill Granger Cookbook*

Ingredients

150g unsalted butter, softened

230g (1 cup) soft brown sugar

1 egg, lightly beaten

2 tsp vanilla extract (optional)

125g (1 cup) plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

Pinch of salt

175g (1 cup) chocolate chips

235g (2 1/3cup) rolled oats

Method

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

Cream butter and sugar in a bowl until fluffy and smooth. Add the egg and vanilla until smooth. Sift flour, baking powder and salt into bowl and mix lightly. Add oats and choc chips and stir to combine.

Roll tbs of mixture into balls and place on baking paper lined trays. Flatten balls with a fork dipped in flour. Bake the cookies for 10-15 mins until pale golden in colour. remove from oven and let cool on trays for 5 minutes.

Makes about 30-36.

Chocolate Whirls

Lovely and delicate but very rich. The ingredients and method is not much different from the Melting Moments recipe...

*Taken from '500 Cookies' by Philippa Vanstone*

for the cookies
225g softened unsalted butter
50g icing sugar
25g dark chocolate, melted (I used a milk chocolate)
225g plain flour
2 tbs Dutch process cocoa powder
3 tbs cornflour

for the filling
50g unsalted butter
190g icing sugar
25g dark chocolate, melted (I used milk chocolate again)

Pre-heat the oven to 175 degrees Celsius. Beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Stir in the chocolate. Sift the flour, cocoa powder and cornflour and stir into the creamed mixture.

Pipe the mixture, using a 1.5 cm fluted nozzle into 5 cm rosettes, spaced 5 cm apart on a non-stick baking sheet. Bake for 10-12 minutes until golden. Allow to firm up slightly before transferring them to a wire rack to cool.

Beat the icing sugar and butter together until light and fluffy and stir in the chocolate. Spread the filling onto the bottom half of the cookies and then sandwich together with the other halves.

Makes 1 1/2 dozen.

Melting Moments...

These are not called Melting Moments for no reason. Trust me...

*Taken from 500 Cookies by Philippa Vanstone*

for the cookies..
225g softened unsalted butter
50g icing sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
225g plain flour
3 tbsp cornflour

for the filling
50g unsalted butter
125g icing sugar
2 tsp vanilla essence
3 tbsp fruit jam, any flavour (I used plum)

Pre-heat the oven to 175C. Beat butter, icing sugar and vanilla essence together until light and fluffy. Sift the flour and cornflour and stir into creamed mixture. Using a 1cm fluted nozzle and piping bag, pipe the mixture into 2 1/2 cm rosettes, 4cm apart on a non-stick baking sheet.

Bake for 10 to 12 mins until golden. Allow the cookies to firm up slightly before transferring them to a wire rack to cool.

Beat the butter and icing sugar together with the vanilla essence until light and fluffy. Spread jam onto the bottom of half the cookies and then spread or pipe the filling onto the other halves. Sandwich together. Store in an airtight container for three to four days.

Makes 1 1/2 dozen