Ginger Cookies

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

It is funny that while I am on my laptop working on my assignment, I feel like posting a recipe, Emm very bad of me.

Ingredients:

200 grams salted butter

1 cup packed light brown sugar

1 cup corn flour

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons freshly grounded dry ginger

• Beat sugar and butter till light and fluffy
• Sift together corn flour and all purpose flour and add ginger to it
• add the dry ingredients to the sugar and butter mixture and mix using your hand or a wooden spoon
• use a cutter to shape into cookies, bake in a preheated oven (165 degrees Celsius) for 15 minutes.

I should have these cookies beside me as I'm concentrating (very hard) on my assignment :)

Cheese Cookies-And Happy Eid

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

I've seen this recipe somewhere, and made a mental note of it. and now I've spent long time searching for the blog where I found the recipe, but couldn't find it. I loved the idea and adapted it, but still I want to link back to give credit to the one who made it, will still look for it.I made these for eid as we bake and bake lots of sweets to serve for guests and take to the houses we visit as well. Happy Eid everyone...:)

Cheese cake cookies (adapted from somewhere):

400 gram salted butter, softened

1 cup sugar

4 1/2 cups flour (I remember the original recipe called for 3 1/2)

1 cup cream cheese

2 tsp baking powder (mixed with the flour)

2 eggs

vanilla

crushed digestive biscuits

• Beat butter, sugar and cheese till mixed well, add eggs one at a time and then add vanilla
• add flour and continue mixing at low speed
• the dough will be soft, so you can cover it and refrigerate it for around one hour
• shape your cookies and roll them on crushed biscuits, bake for around 15 minutes 160 degrees Celsius

Date cookies

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

These are the kind of cookies we serve for guests, or finish them off ourselves. We have them with Arabic coffee , but you can enjoy them with a glass of milk as well :). While I watch the tv, I remove date seeds, eat the date, or make a cake, or these cookies . In this way the task doesn't become really boring.

the date ball

Ingredients (slightly adapted from here) :

1-1 1/2 cup date (depends how much date you want in your cookies)

1 tsp cinnamon powder

200 gram salted butter

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

3 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 or 3/4 cup caster sugar

• Mix the date with Cinnamon powder and set aside
• Beat butter and sugar till light and fluffy
• Add eggs, one at a time, add vanilla
• Add flour, mix till combined
• roll small part of the dough using a rolling pin, add some rolled date, close it and cut, emm I can't explain it, but hope the photos are able to.

• bake in oven set to 175 degrees Celsius for ten minutes
• keep in tight container

Biscuit Sandwich Cookies

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

I have a small cook book called "Gorgeous biscuits" -family circle, and I have been looking in the net for a link to refer to it but couldn't find any information. Well, I can take a picture of my copy but it is in a really bad condition lol. My son loves it and walks around with it, and you can find it thrown everywhere.

Anyway, I've attempted baking these specific cookies because of my son. He has seen the pictures and insisted on having them. The cookies are chewy, not the crunchy or crispy type that some people like. Personally I prefer the crunchy cookies if I am using a filling.


The filling has the tangy lemony flavour. I wanted to make the caramel filling but I didn't have condensed milk, but sure I will attempt it next time.

If I feel down, sad or a bit depressed, I bake. It does make me feel better. Specially if some frosting is involved. :)

Ingredients (for the cookies):

125 gm butter

1/2 cup caster sugar

1 egg

1/4 tsp vanilla

1 cup all purpose flour

1 cup self-raising flour

Lime butter filling (ingredients):

60 gm butter

1 cup icing sugar

2 tsp lime juice

finally shredded rind of a lime (I didn't add this)

(for the filling: beat butter and sugar until smooth, add the lime juice, beat till mixture is speadable).

• Preheat oven to 165 degrees Celsius
• beat butter and caster sugar until fluffy and creamy
• Add the egg and 1/4 tsp vanilla and beat well
• sift the flours and fold them into the mixture, I used a wooden spoon then continued with my hand
• you might need extra flour as the dough is quite soft
• using biscuit cutters, cut into desired shapes

• bake in batches for 10-15 minutes.

• cool the biscuits then cover half of the biscuits with the filling and sandwich with the other half.
• it makes around 50 pieces of biscuits.

for the caramel filling:

30 gm butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup condensed milk

• melt butter, brown sugar and condensed milk in a pan and bring to boil till mixture thickens
• cool and spread on biscuits

Cookies with royal icing

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

I've been keen to try to make the royal icing for a while now, and have searched a lot about it. It looked beautiful and interesting, and what made me really want to have a go is that you can customise it.

You won't believe it if I said I've never had it. I think it is not something very commonly seen in our culture.So I have looked for things you need to make it, but haven't found all the things I needed, nonetheless I did make it.

I bought big cookie cutters, as I thought that I will be working on small details for the first time, I need a big space, however it has proven unnecessary.I had number 5 decorating tip so I looked for smaller ones and I could only find number 1, which was too small and causes pain when trying to squeeze too hard :S..

My cookies recipe:

2 1/2 cups flour

1 cup caster sugar

200 gm salted butter (two sticks)

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

Method:

• beat the butter and sugar till light and fluffy
• add the egg and vanilla and continue beating
• add flour, beat with the mixer for one minute, then continue mixing with hand

when using the cutters, you will need to flour your surface otherwise it will be difficult to work with the dough.

bake for 10 minutes.

I was happy to find a recipe without egg whites (my kids will be eating those so I am not keen on them eating egg whites uncooked), and without meringue which I couldn't find here at all.

The recipe of the royal icing was from this wonderful blog:

1 cup icing sugar

1 tbs milk (and more)

1 drop lemon juice

1 tbs light corn syrup

• combine icing sugar, lemon juice and corn syrup
• add the milk, start with 1 tbs and add till you reach favourable consistency

I had fun outlining the cookies and flooding them. Then my mistake was that I was totally impatient and wanted to do some decorations while the base was still wet. and so whatever design I wanted to make spread, so I had to stick to some dots only lol..

I hated the smell of corn syrup, so I didn't eat the cookies for the first two days and I thought I'd never do, but by the third day the effect of that very sugary sweet day faded and I ate some and enjoyed them !..

an important tip, get bigger decorating tip, tip number 1 was a disaster for me and the icing wouldn't come out  as I forgot to sift the icing when I wanted to decorate. (this is an important step)

the cookie on the left has the silent letter (h) in Arabic (my son's initial)
and the one below is (a) in Arabic (my daughter's initial)

on the second day, not anymore shiny:)

Will I ever do it again,,, emm maybe once in a while, and on few occasions..:)

My favourite cookies

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

I looooove these cookies, and when I make them, they only last for less than an hour as me and my kids finish them off as soon as they're cooled...:D

Ingredients:

150 g butter

1 1/2 cups self-raising flour

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/3 cup caster (white) sugar

1 egg yolk

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup chocolate chips

المقادير:

150 غم زبدة

كوب ونصف طحين بالخميرة

ربع كوب سكر اسمر

ثلث كوب سكر ابيض مطحون

صفار بيضة

ملعقة شاي فانيلا

كوب حبيبات الشكولاته

Method:

• Using a mixer, beat butter, sugars and yolk until creamy

• add flour and chips, mix with your hand or stir with a spoon

• roll mixture (around one tbs) into ball, press each ball

• Bake for 15 minutes
• tip: as my cookies bake in the oven, I further press them so they are not very thick in the middle.

Cookies

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

I found the original recipe from this blog, I changed it a bit.

Ingredients:

3 cups flour (add more if the dough is too soft to handle)

1 cup butter

1 1/4 cups icing sugar

1 egg, beaten

1 tsp vanilla

1 tsp salt

المقادير:

3 اكواب طحين (اضيفي المزيد إذا كانت العجينة لينة وصعبة التقطيع بعد العجن)

كوب زبدة

كوب وربع سكر ناعم مطحون

بيضة واحدة مخفوقة

ملعقة شاي فانيلا

ملعقة شاي ملح

Method:

• Cream butter, add sugar and blend till fluffy
• Add egg and vanilla and blend for 1 minute
• Add flour and salt and mix by hand

• Roll dough on a floured surface
• cut into shapes you like and bake in a preheated oven at 165 degrees for around 10 minutes

Scottish Short Bread

Asalaam Alaykum Muslimat and hello to all readers.

I'll be starting with one of my favourite biscuits, the Scottish short bread. I used to enjoy these biscuits in my stay in Scotland, so when I came back home, I had to learn how to make them..:). They are great to serve for guests with coffee and they are a must now in my Eid baking list (Eid=celebration in Islam)

Ingredients:

400 gram unsalted butter

1 3/4 cups corn flour

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup rice flour

1 cup icing sugar

1 teaspoon salt

Method:

• In a bowl, mix all ingredients with hand
• flatten the dough, and cut into shapes you like
• preheat oven to 160-170 degrees, place them on the baking tray, and bake for around 10 minutes or so, I use an electric oven so it does take me a bit longer.