Kifli

I just had to post these nut filled, melt in your mouth morsels that I learned to make from my mother-in-law and were always made for Easter. The original recipe used fresh yeast in the pastry which was totally foreign and a bit intimidating to me at the time some thirty plus years ago.

This recipe which I found later does not use yeast but is almost identical in taste and produces the most flakiest pastry ever. I did alter the recipe slightly by using butter instead of margarine which made all the difference in the world. As the commercial goes, "butter is better". On Easter morning we would devour these addictive cookies with cups of coffee.

I wish you all a very Happy Easter.

Kifli

Dough

4 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups salted butter
4 egg yolks, lightly beaten
1 cup sour cream

Filling

4 cups walnuts, ground
1 cup sugar
½ cup milk
1 tbsp. almond extract

Cut butter into flour until crumbly. Add egg yolks and sour cream and knead into a smooth dough. If the dough is very sticky knead in a little flour. Divide the dough into thirds. Take one portion of the dough and cover the rest with plastic wrap. Roll the dough out quite thin on a floured surface into a rectangle. To ensure that the dough does not stick to the counter lift the dough from time to time while rolling out and sprinkle the counter with flour. With a sharp knife cut the dough into 2-inch squares. Mix filling ingredients together and place 1 teaspoonful onto each square. Roll from one corner to form a crescent. Repeat with remaining dough. Place on ungreased cookie sheets close together and bake for about 10 minutes or until golden. Remove from oven and cool on racks for a few minutes then roll each cookie in icing sugar.

Christmas Cookies - Spitzbuben

Long before the season was in full swing I announced that I would not be baking as many cookies as I usually do for Christmas. I had decided with full conviction that I would bake two batches of the most popular cookies and that would be it. But as the season approached, the pull of baking one or two more cookies - new cookies that I had not baked before - was too great to resist and so I found myself leafing through seasonal magazines yet again for new recipes. One of these recipes was for Spitzbuben, a sandwiched cookies that I had always wanted to bake. I had even bought the proper cookie cutter.

The ingredients for the dough consist of your basic sugar cookie dough; butter, icing sugar, egg yolks, flour and salt. Once the dough is mixed it is wrapped and refrigerated for one hour. The dough is then divided into six even pieces and each piece is rolled out to a 9" square. Using a 2" round cookie cutter cut out circles of dough, then you cut an equal amount of circles with a special insert to the cookie cutter that cuts a decorative hole in the centre. The dough is baked and cooled.

Meanwhile seedless raspberry jam is heated in a small pot to thicken and reduce by one quarter and because there are chocoholics in the family I decided to make a chocolate ganache as well to fill the cookies.

About a teaspoon of filling is spread over a cookie and another cookie, with the decorative hole, is dusted with icing sugar and placed on top. It takes a bit of time to put these cookies together but in the end you are rewarded with a really pretty cookie that tastes really good.

I've also baked Cinnamon Rugelach, Lora Brody's Rugelach, Kifli, French Macaroons and Pecan Tarts and made White Chocolate Bark with Pistachios and Cranberries and Truffles. So much for two batches only - maybe next year.


A tin of cookies ready for giving.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Spitzbuben

3/4 lb. butter, softened (3 sticks)

1-1/2 cup icing sugar

3 egg yolks

3-1/2 cups flour

Pinch of salt

1 cup seedless raspberry jam

Icing sugar for dusting

Beat butter and icing sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg yolks one at a time beating until smooth after each addition. Mix flour and salt together and then add flour mixture 1/2 cup at a time beating between additions. Scrape the dough onto a large sheet of plastic wrap. Press into a 9" x 11" rectangle and cover with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 325 F. Place two racks evenly spaced in the centre fo the oven. Divide chilled dough into 6 even pieces, then rewrap 5 pieces and put back in fridge.

On a lightly floured surface, work one dough piece at a time. Keeping surface and dough floured, roll dough into a 9" square. Using a to 2" round cookie cutter, cut out circles of dough and transfer them to a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper, spacing cookies about 1" apart (reserve dough scraps for rerolling later). Repeat process with remaining chilled dough pieces, then combine leftover scraps into a ball, reroll and continue circles until most of the dough is gone. Using small star cookie cutter punch a hole in the centre of half of the circles - these will become the tops. Bake all cookies in batches, rotating pans on racks halfway through, until cookies are a pale-golden colour, about 15 minutes. Let cookies cool.

Pour raspberry jam into a samll pot and heat over medium until it comes to a boil, stirring every so often. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, still stirring, until thickened and reduced by one-quarter, about 5 minutes. Transfer jam to a bowl and cool.

Using a fine-mesh sieve, dust cookie tops with icing sugar. Turn whole cookies upside down and spoon about 1 teaspoon of jam onto each cookie. Using a small spatuala, spread jam to 1/8" of the edges leaving a small mound of jam in the centre of the cookie. Cover each with a cookie top. Serve cookies immediately or store between sheets of waxed paper in an airtight container at room temperature or freeze.

Grammy's Chocolate Cookies

My daughter Andrea is giving her best friend Eryn a bridal shower at the end of July, just a week after I get back from Italy, and Andrea has asked me to help her out. I won’t give away everything we are making for the shower just in case Eryn reads this, but I can say that I will be baking some cookies for the event. As well, my friend and neighbour Maria asked if I would bake some cookies for her son’s fiancé’s shower, taking place the day after I get back. So I will hit two birds with one stone by baking big batches of cookies ahead of time for both parties. I asked Andrea, while she was on the phone with Eryn one day, to ask her what kind of cookies she likes and without any hesitation Eryn said “anything with chocolate”.

As I flipped through my binder of recipes for cakes and cookies I’ve collected over the years I came across a chocolate cookie that would fit this bill. Grammy's Chocolate Cookies are chocolaty crisp cookies that would satisfy any chocolate lover as the recipe has a generous ¾ cup of cocoa powder and it yields over 100 cookies, plenty for both showers.

I can just picture Grandma baking up a batch of this easy cookie for all her grandchildren when they come to visit and I can picture all her grandchildren dunking these delicious cookies in their glasses of milk and devouring every single bite.

They really are very simple to whip up. Mix the butter, sugar and eggs until light a fluffy and gradually add a mixture of dry ingredients, flour, baking powder, cocoa, salt into the egg mixture. Refrigerate the dough for one hour and then roll the dough into one inch balls and dip the top of th cookie into a bit of granulated sugar. Place the balls onto parchment paper on a cookie sheet and bake for 8 to 10 minutes. The little balls of dough flatten out as they bake. I placed them into freezer bags to keep for the shower.

Grammy’s Chocolate Cookies
Makes about 100

2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup Dutch-process cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1-1/4 cups unsalted butter, room temperature
2 cups sugar, plus more for dipping
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1. Sift together flour, coco powder, baking soda, and slat. Set aside.
2. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter, sugar, and eggs on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add vanilla, and mix to combine. Gradually add dry ingredients, and combine with mixer on low speed. Cover bowl with plastic wrap, and chill until dough is firm, about 1 hour.
3. Heat oven to 350 F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper or Silpat mats. Roll dough into 1-inch balls. Dip top of each ball into sugar. Place on prepared baking sheets about 1-1/2 inches apart. Bake until set, about 8 minutes. Transfer to a rack to cool. Cool on Baking Sheets for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool

Biscotti

Many years ago on CityLine - Canada's longest running lifestyle show - Sandra Pittana, the fashion expert who is a regular guest on the show, deviated from the norm of fashionista and from her kitchen showed how she made her favourite recipe for biscotti. This particular recipe yields quite of lot of cookies so the dough can be divided into two or three bowls to which you can add different ingredients such as almonds, hazelnuts, pecans, cranberries, dried cherries, chocolate chips or any combination thereof, and end up with three different flavoured biscotti. Of course I knew that I would try this recipe, and although I’d been making biscotti for a while, after trying these any prior recipe became history and this one became my favourite. Until recently.

As Ontarians we have to buy our liquor from the LCBO (Liquor Control Board of Ontario). Yes, our government has total control of the liquor sold here, and why would they give that up to privatization? After all, the LCBO is a cash cow for them. Now that I got that off my chest, I will say that the LCBO has two pluses: one is that the stores are really beautiful and wonderful to shop from (not like the old dowdy establishments they use to run years ago, where you would hand a requisition with a list of liquor you wanted to purchase to a clerk who in turn would go to the back to retrieve your bottles) with well stocked aisles of every kind of liquor and wine you might want, including a vintage section. Some of the stores offer taste samples and run cooking classes as well. The second is that they put out the Food and Drink magazine about six times a year, a beautiful glossy magazine with great recipes and gorgeous mouth watering photos to whet your appetite and it’s free. You can check out their website http://www.lcbo.com/lcbo-ear/RecipeController?action=search&language=1&recipeType=1 for all their past issues’ recipes.

In the recent “Early Summer 2010” issue in the Techniques 101 section of the magazine was a recipe for Biscotti. The photos begged to be made and it was an easy recipe to put together as well. This recipe called for dried cherries but since I’m not so crazy about them, I thought I would substitute them with cranberries which I prefer. When I started the recipe, I realized I didn’t have any on hand, so I opted for currants instead which I like as well and thankfully had on hand.

You basically mix the dry ingredients along with the nuts and fruit in one bowl and the wet ingredients in another and mix the two together. The dough is slightly wetter than the one in Sandra Pittana’s recipe so I found that rubbing some oil on your hands before shaping helps to keep all the sticky dough off your hands. After you have shaped them into two ovals along the width of the sheet pan you bake them for about 35 minutes. After cooling slightly you cut them into 1/2” slices and bake again to dry them, very easy. The biscotti were delicious and a couple of days later I made them again with cranberries. This time I shaped the dough along the length of the pan so that when you sliced the loaves the biscotti were a bit smaller in length. They were also very good.

So now I have two recipes for biscotti that I love. One yields more biscotti and you can easily divide the dough to add different nuts and fruit or chocolate to have a variety of flavours. The other is just slightly easier to mix together because you use oil instead of butter. I’ve included recipes for both.

Best Biscotti
Sandra Pittana

4 eggs
2 tbsp. liqueur (brandy, amaretto, etc)
2 tbsp. vanilla
4-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tbsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt
1 cup butter, at room temperature
1-1/2 cups granulated sugar


Wisk together eggs, liqueur and vanilla.

Sift together, flour, baking powder and salt.

In a large bowl cream together butter and sugar until fluffy. Gradually beat in egg
mixture until thoroughly combined. Stir in flour mixture. Divide into 3 or 4 equal
amounts.

Add flavourings to each individual dough, enough that there are lots of chunks but not so much that the dough can’t hold together. (Between ¾ cup and 1 cup total per dough if divided in four pieces 1-1/3 cups if divided into three pieces.)

On two parchment-lined baking sheets, shape into 12 by 1-1/2 inch logs for 4 pieces, or 16 x 1-1/2 inch logs for 3 pieces.
Bake in a preheated 325 F. oven for 30 minutes or until firm and golden. Let cool on baking sheet 15 minutes; transfer to a cutting board.
Cut diagonally into ½ inch thick slices using a serrated knife. Lay cookies flat in baking sheets; bake about 25 minutes longer or until golden brown and crisp, turning once during baking.
Makes about 5 dozen biscotti.

Suggested flavours for additions:

• Pistachio, dried cranberries or cherries, white chocolate and orange zest.

• Orange zest, cinnamon, dried cranberries and toasted pecans.

• Almonds, white and dark chocolate chunks or chips.

• Orange zest, almonds or pecans, and cranberries.

Cherry Almond Biscotti

Food & Drink Magazine

Butter, to grease cookie sheet (I used parchment paper)
2 cups all-purpose flour
¾ cup granulated sugar
1 tbsp. baking powder
Pinch of salt
1 cup coarsely chopped almonds
½ cup dried cherries (cranberries, currants, chocolate)
1 tbsp. grated orange rind
3 large eggs
½ cup olive oil
¼ cup fresh orange juice or amaretto
Glaze
1 egg, beaten
Pinch of Salt
¼ cup granulated sugar
1. Preheat oven to 325 F. Butter and flour a cookie sheet or line with parchment paper.
2. In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, chopped almonds, cherries, and orange rind.
3. Whisk together eggs and olive oil. Stir in orange juice. Make a well in middle of dry ingredients and slowly stir in liquid ingredients to form a dough.
4. Divide dough and place on cookie sheet. Shape into 2 loaves, about 9 x 5 inches. Brush on beaten egg and sprinkle with salt and sugar. Bake for 30 minutes or until dough is a golden colour with cracks on top. It will not be firm to the touch.
5. Cool on racks for 20 minutes, then cut into ½-inch slices. Place on cookie sheets and bake for 15 minutes on each side or until golden brown and dried out. Cool on racks.
Makes 24 pieces.

Christmas Baking Part Two

As I mentioned in my last entry I used to start baking cookies in November, so that most of the baking would be done by mid December and not leave everything to the end and stress myself silly. This year I’ve left it too close to Christmas and I’m now stressing myself silly. You see if I don’t bake cookies that my family are use to it is not left unnoticed and I get comments like “didn’t you bake these” or “are you going to bake these” and “you have to bake these”, and I don’t want to let anyone down so there is a ‘must bake’ list of cookies with one or two new ones thrown in to keep things fresh.

A couple of days ago I baked the 'absolute must bake' Jewel Cookies from Martha Stewart. They are a favourite of both my daughter and son and they are pretty delicious. They are your typical thumbprint cookie rolled in chopped pecans with a raspberry jam center. I don’t use my thumb to make the depression but the end of a wooden spoon. I have to mention also that my husband doesn’t like jam, so I place a chocolate chip in the center of half of the cookies which is fine because they taste just as good, besides it looks like I’ve baked two different batches.

Today I baked three different cookies. The first I baked aren’t a cookie at all but Mini Pecan Raisin Tarts which I’ve been baking for ever. The recipe was given to me by a friend so I don’t know their origins but they are a favourite of mine. The original recipe was call Uva Tarts, (uva translated means raisins), but hubby doesn’t like raisins (are you seeing a pattern here?) so half the filling has pecans only and half has the raisin and pecans. One of the mini tart pans I have is slightly smaller than the other two and I make the raisin pecan tarts in that one and the slightly larger mini tart pans are used for the pecan only tarts, that way there is no confusion to which one is which. Again with the same recipe I get two different tarts. These are time consuming because you have to make the dough and prepare the filling, then roll out the dough, line the pans and fill with fillings and bake and repeat until all the dough and filling are used up. You get about a million tarts with this recipe but could certainly make half the recipe if you wish.

The second I baked were Evelyn’s Christmas Cookies, from John Clancy's Christmas Cookbook, that again I’ve been baking for ever. Evelyn was his friend and neighbour and from whom the recipe came from. They are super simple to make and they are simply flavoured with vanilla and you can’t just eat one. These are also a thumbprint cookie, filled with raspberry jam and yup, you guess it, I place a chocolate chip in about half the cookies. To shape the cookies fast and the same size, I divide the dough into two pieces and roll it out into a long rope and cut it into even pieces that will approximately give me a one inch ball and roll each piece into a ball. It almost looks like I'm making gnocchi doesn't it?

I was left with four egg whites from the last two recipes so I made Amaretti, (Almond Macaroons) a favourite Italian cookie which has a nice crisp exterior and soft chewy interior and are quite delicious. This recipe was also given to me by a friend many years ago and I have been baking them ever since. They are super simple to make with only four ingredients; egg whites, sugar, ground almonds and almond extract. I top half of the cookies with a whole almond and the other half with a whole coffee bean. No picky husband here, he likes both.

I feel good that I have got this baking done, now I only have some cakes to bake.

I don't have the Mini Tarts in my files yet but I have included the recipes for the other three. They all freeze beautifully.

Jewel Cookies
Martha Stewart

1-1/2 cups unsalted butter
1 cup packed light-brown sugar
2 large eggs, separated
2 tsp. vanilla extract
¼ tsp. salt
2-2/3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
2 cups finely chopped pecans
1 cup thick raspberry jam

Preheat oven to 350 F. and line baking sheets with parchment paper.

Cream butter and sugar. Beat in egg yolks, vanilla, and salt, then the flour. Shape dough into 1-inch balls. Brush each dough ball with beaten egg whites, then roll in the chopped pecans. Place balls 2 to 3 inches apart on baking sheets. Press the center of each ball with your thumb, and fill with ½ teaspoon of jam.

Bake until just golden around the edges, 8 to 10 minutes. Cool cookies on rack.
Makes 5 dozen cookies.

Evelyn’s Christmas Cookies
John Clancy's Christmas Cookies

1 cup unsalted butter
2/3 cup granulated sugar
2 large egg yolks
2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted
½ cup raspberry jam

Preheat the oven to 375 F.

Cream the butter and sugar until very light in colour. Add the egg yolks and continue to beat until the mixture is fluffy. Stir in the vanilla, and gradually add the flour.

To form the cookies, pat 1 tablespoon of dough at a time into a 1-inch diameter ball and place it on a lightly greased or parchment lined baking sheet. With your fingertip, make an indentation in the top of each cookie. I use the end of the handle of a wooden spoon to make indentations dipping it into some flour from time to time so that the dough doesn’t stick to it. Spoon raspberry jam into each indentation.

Bake the cookies on the middle rack of the oven for about 8 minutes, or until the edges turn a light golden brown.

For a different variation add a chocolate chip in the middle of each cookie instead of the jam.

Amaretti – Almond Macaroons

4 cups ground almonds
1-1/2 cups sugar
4 egg whites
1 tsp. almond extract
Whole Almonds

Beat egg whites till frothy, add sugar and beat until they are stiff. Add extract and ground almonds. Dough should be somewhat stiff. Take about one tablespoon of dough and roll into a 1-inch ball, and roll into granulated sugar. When your hand become sticky rinse with water. Place on parchment lined cookie sheet and top each one with a whole almond.
Note: You can also top the amaretti with a whole coffee bean, or red or green candied cherries that have been quartered.