Chestnut Cookies

When I saw this cookie on Jennifurla's , I was totally smitten. Chestnut!!! How creative this is.
And with 2 packs of chestnuts that I have, I just can’t give this recipe a miss.

The recipe is adapted from a Russian tea cake/Mexican wedding cake recipe, something similar to our local Kuih Makmur, a popular Raya cookie. So, if you love chestnuts and those said cookies, you shouldn’t not try this.It's not difficult to make, provided if don't need to peel ur own chestnuts.
It dense (not fluffy) due to the moist finely milled chestnuts, but melts in the mouth, plus, it’s wonderfully fragrant with chestnuts.

But one confession to make, Lyanne’s saliva is present in this cookie. When I went to Jusco few days back to do my weekly grocery shopping, Anchor butter was on sale, so I took 6 blocks. While queuing to pay money, Lyanne grabbed a block of butter, unwrapped it and started licking the butter. Lydia screamed ,"Mommy, SEEEEE!!" Lyanne was happily savouring that unfortunate block of butter. I quickly removed it from her, placed the wrapper back on and proceeded to queue. Lyanne screamed at me, asking for that butter back. LOL. It was a funny and ugly sight. Kid screaming for butter at the supermarket, I'm still laughing now.

My kids love butter as much as I do. It’s in the genes. So, when I wanted to make this cookie, I used up the contaminated block first. Anyway, that’s kid’s saliva and it’s baked, so, whatever that might be in there, is already killed. It’s safe! LOL.

All that I got from the recipe, 130 pieces of cookies in raw form

Chestnut Cookies
Loosely adapted  from Smitten Kitchen
Yields: 130pcs smallish cookies the size of a small fishball.

225gm butter, softened
50gm icing sugar
225gm roasted chestnuts (I used packaged roasted chestnuts, pics seen at the bottom of this post, I ate a few, which was why I was left with 225gm)
250gm +50gm cake flour
Icing sugar for coating (won’t need much, but it depends on your coating technique :p)

1. Mill package chestnuts until fine. Mix with 250gm cake flour.
2. Mix butter and icing sugar with a large spoon. No need to beat til fluffy, just mix to combine.
3. Pour half of the chestnut flour into butter mixture and mix. Add in the balance.
4. If dough is too wet and soft, adjust with the 50gm of flour, you may not add all. Some chestnuts are drier and some are wetter.
5. Form small balls of dough, as big as a small fishball, or the size of a small lime.
6. Preheat oven to 180(fan)/200C
7. Arrange on baking pan (1 inch space is enough) and bake for 12 minutes. If your cookies are larger, please extend the time.
8. Place ½ cup icing sugar in a small basin, if icing sugar is clumpy, run it in the mill for a few seconds.
9. When cookies are done, remove from oven. While they are still hot, coat with icing sugar by putting a few of the hot cookies into the icing sugar(8) and move the basin with a sifiting motion to coat. Place sugared cookies back on to tray and let it cool and coat the rest of the cookies in the same way.

in its baked form and the difference of being bare and made up with "powder"

that's the size of my cookie by comparison

I hated the wind when I took these pictures. Blew away all the nice "make up"

I am submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #3: My Favorite CNY Cookie (Jan 2011)

Apricot Sesame Cookies

When I was a teen, I’ve always wanted to bake cookies with jam fillings. And they always, always bubble and overflow and get burnt even before the cookie is done. I never knew why and always have been skeptical when it comes to baking with jam.

Then I made my first jam. Then I found that real jam will not bubble that much, because when I cooked it, the setting stage has already gotten past all the bubbling and bubbling. Most of our jams, especially the more affordable ones are made with pectin and flavouring, rather than real fruit. They consist of very little real fruit, and the preparation process is different from real fruit jam, which explains why it bubbles so much. And when I came across the recipe, I know, with my homemade real fruit jam, it will work perfectly.


If you all remembered, I bought a lot of sugar apricots and I also commented that my jam made with sugar apricot lacked tartness, which is usually found with apricots. Then for my balance of apricots(that I didn’t know what to do with earlier and after I baked the apricot yogurt cake, there was still 1 punnet left), I threw in the zest of one whole lemon and juice from the lemon as well. It worked perfectly and my sugar apricot finally had some tartness in it, to offset the super sweetness of the fruit. The lemony apricot jam really worked wonders with the flavor here.

Apricot Sesame Cookies Recipe
Source: Taste of Home

115gm butter
50gm caster sugar
170gm all purpose flour
Sesame seeds for rolling (mine is very very fine)
Homemade Apricot jam for filling (or buy the one that offers the highest fruit content)

1. Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
2. Sift flour and mix until incorporated.
3. Form small balls of dough about the size of a calamansi lime and roll them round and coat the balls with sesame seed. Place on baking tray (I didn’t line or butter the tray)
4. Preheat oven to 180/200C
5. With a wooden spoon or the handle of any other apparatus that seems suitable, make an indentation in the ball.
6. Fill indentations with some jam.
7. Bake in preheated oven for 12 minutes or until lightly golden.

8. Cool on a wire rack. Keep in air tight container.

Verdict: These are super yummy!! For a person who loves any bakes with fruits (or maybe anything with apricots, LOL), I'm super sold by this. I'd say, it depends on the jam. Maybe you can use homemade pineapple jam with this, as the cookie itself is soft and fluffy. Or maybe just make your own apricot jam for this. There are apricots in the supermarkets now, and if they are super sweet, just throw in lots of lemon zest and juice to add some nice tartness to it. With or without sesame? Personally, I find the sesame seeds nothing much on this cookie. Maybe they weren't toasted before hand. So, they weren't all that fragrant. It just makes it look better with not much taste. The next time I make this, I'll skip the sesame seeds. Save money and save time.

Maybe you'd ask, I don't want to make jam. Can I use any jam off the shelf? The answer, is maybe not. It might bubble and spill and get burnt even before the cookies are done. But there is onething called baking jam. I'm not sure about baking jam, though. I have never used it before, but I've seen it at bakery supply shops. it specifically states "baking jam", so it could be the type of jam you could substitute with if you don't have home made jam. Anyone can help with this?

I am thinking of experimenting with a jam that uses dried apricots so that readers from anywhere in Malaysia can make some, but wait, give me 3 more months. I am trying to clear my pantry as I am going to move end of February, and this time, it's for sure!!! I don't care and I want to move.

I am submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #3: My Favorite CNY Cookie (Jan 2011)

Lemon Cloud Tea Cookies

Love these cookies!!! They are soft and fluffy, like clouds, but not like kuih bangkit that is dry and floury in the mouth. Very light and not cloying at all. One can easily down half a jar in one go. Hahaha.

My girls devoured them so quickly that I had to hide them. Hide them away so that I can have some too, hahahaha!!! Wicked Mother!!

Lemon cloud tea cookies
Adapted from : Technicolor Kitchen who adapted from Joy

105gm all purpose flour
55gm cornstarch
2 teaspoons baking powder
60g salted butter, softened
50g confectioners’ sugar
1 large eggs
1 teaspoon lemon juice (didn't half this)
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest (didn't half this too)

1. Preheat oven to 160°C/180C. Line baking sheets with baking paper.
2. Sift the flour, cornstarch, and baking powder in a bowl. Set aside.
3. Combine the butter and confectioners’ sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer. Beat on low speed with the paddle until well mixed. Increase the speed to medium and continue beating until light, about 2 minutes.
4. Beat in the eggs one at a time. Batter may look broken and curdled. Beat in the juice and zest.
5. Decrease the speed to low and beat in the flour mixture. Remove the bowl from the mixer and give the dough a few good turns with your spatula to bring it all together.
6. Arrange rounded teaspoons of the dough on prepared pans. Space the balls about 5cm (2in) apart. After all the cookies have been placed on the pan, flour a fork and press a crisscross design into the top of each mound of dough.
7. Bake the cookies until they spread and become golden, about 20 minutes. Slide the parchment paper off the pan to cool completely.

If your baking powder is fresh, I think the biscuits will be even puffier. But still, these are very good.

I am submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #3: My Favorite CNY Cookie (Jan 2011)

Thousand Layer Tofu with Miso Sauce

What's thousand layer tofu?
It's actually a thawed frozen tofu that looks like it has many many layers inside. The outer parts of the tofu seem to have better layers and the inside ones has tighter layers.
I didn't come up with this idea, but got to know about it through Wikipedia and googled for more information on it.
You can use it for steamboat, pan fries or what ever sauces. I tried it with Miso sauce.

How to make this?
I used a block of Japanese Style Tofu (not egg tofu) and froze it. It looks yellowish when frozen.

Then, I thawed it over night in the fridge and it went all pock marked

Then slice it

Then I placed one piece on my palm, and gently press with the other palm to remove excess water

Then pan fry it, and arrange it nicely on a serving dish. Dilute some miso paste in boiling water, making it a lot more concentrated than your regular miso soup and drizzle it over the fried tofu. Top with sliced spring onions.

Next week,

6 Days of Cookies :)

Tomato Curry Chicken

A dish that my mom told me verbally how to cook.

When I was in my teens, someone told my mom about a curry that is without coconut milk but uses tomatoes. She told me to come up with what she told me. Being the obedient child that I am (hahaha!!), I gladly obliged. And the outcome was a wonderful dish to go with rice.


Tomato Curry Chicken
Recipe Source : Verbal instructions from Wendyywy's mom

1.5kg chicken (1 bird)
250gm tomato (2 large ones)
1 tsp salt
250gm carrots
150gm onions
3 cloves garlic
2 red chillies
2 Tbsp meat curry powder
1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
Salt to taste
1 tsp cornstarch mix with ¼ cup water

1. Chop chicken into small pieces and marinate with 1 tsp salt for 30 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, peel and cut carrots into longish chunks, quarter tomatoes, cut onions into wedges and loosen the onions, slice chillies thickly, and peel and smash the garlic.
3. Heat wok until very hot, put in onions. Toss until the onions are fragrant, then put in 1 tsp oil and toss until it looks browned and very slightly charred. Dish up and set aside
4. Put in 1 Tbsp oil and put in carrots and let them brown for a while then the tomatoes. When everything is slightly browned and fragrant, toss up and set aside.
5. In the same wok, put in 2 Tbsp cooking oil and put in smashed garlic and chilli. Fry until garlic is fragrant, then put in chicken and cook until it starts to brown and get dry. Put in curry powder and fry until fragrant and you can start to see more oil seeping out from the skin.
6. Put in the Worcestershire sauce, carrots and tomatoes, put in enough water to cover. Bring to a boil, cover and let it simmer for 15 minutes or until chicken is more tender.
7. Remove lid and put in onions. Reduce gravy to preferred amount.
8. Taste and season with salt if not salty enough. Sugar will not be necessary.
9. Thicken gravy with cornstarch mixture to preferred consistency. Bring back to a boil and dish up.