Category: Biscuits
Dark Chocolate and Coconut Cookies

Dark Chocolate and Coconut Cookies

By | | Comments 0 Comment

I’ve been thinking a lot about mental health support recently. It’s always there in my mind but over the past week or so it’s been playing on my mind a bit more. Primarily how do we make support for those with mental illness better? We are lucky enough to have great support in the UK through charity groups and in my case university counselling systems, but it’s still no where near enough for the growing numbers of people needing these services. I’m trying to write an article at the moment for an Oxford newspaper about mental health support in the university and during my research I found that around 12% of the university’s undergraduates tend to use the counselling service every year – and that’s just the people who have the courage to seek help. If that’s the number of people in the system how many are suffering across the entire community?

Unfortunately there’s little large-scale difference a single person can make on ground level. We can do our best to help by starting conversations, breaking down taboos, and raising money for the great organisations that are trying to help. But we can’t reduce NHS waiting times or the way in which help is given by these systems. I grant you that this isn’t much of a positive conclusion. I’d prefer to leave you on a grand call to arms ‘this is how we will go forward’ moment, but alas I think the most I can say for now is look after each other. Talk to each other, have real conversations about real things, not just flippant ones about food or reality tv (although they’re great to!). Bake with friends, eat with friends, take some time for yourself. Find what you enjoy and do that. You don’t have time to be doing anything else.

(On a side note, today I felt like writing about something more poignant than cookies, but nonetheless these are super super moreish and really easy to make so I’d really recommend them for group baking and sharing!)

Recipe

Makes 18

Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients

  • 250g Plain flour
  • 1 tsp Baking powder
  • ½ tsp Baking soda
  • 2 tsp Cornflour
  • ¼ tsp Salt
  • 115g Melted butter
  • 150g Brown sugar
  • 50g Caster sugar
  • 1 Large egg
  • 2 tsp Vanilla extract
  • 120g Desiccated coconut
  • 130g Chocolate chips

Method

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 180˚C. Line a couple of baking trays with baking paper.
  2. Put the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cornflour and salt into a large bowl and whisk together to combine.
  3. In another bowl whisk together the melted butter and the two sugars until fully combined. Then whisk in the egg and vanilla.
  4. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and then mix with a wooden spoon until a smooth dough forms. Add the desiccated coconut and the chocolate chips and mix again to incorporate them.
  5. Separate and then roll the dough into small balls (about 1 tbsp of mixture each) and then place them on the lined baking trays with some space between them.
  6. Bake the biscuits for 10-12 minutes until spread and starting to turn golden. Leave to cool and then eat!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Chocolate and Vanilla Rabbit Cookies

Chocolate and Vanilla Rabbit Cookies

By | | Comments 0 Comment

Happy Easter! It might seem a little late to have a Easter-themed recipe, but if like me your whole family’s getting together today and you need a baking activity to keep little people occupied (and use up some of the vast quantities of mini eggs floating around) then look no further. I came across this way of shaping cookies online and it looked so cute that I thought I’d give it a try. Granted mine look a little more quirky than the ones I saw on Pinterest and whilst I quite like the variation in my herd I’m gonna blame this on my gingerbread man cutter. The idea is that you make gingerbread men, then fold the arms over a mini egg in the middle, turn them upside down and poke some eyes in and hey presto you’ve got yourself a rabbit holding an Easter egg! Unfortunately my gingerbread man cutter was very human shaped so the bodies were longer than they should have been and as a result I’ve de-capitated the men to get my rabbits, but hey ho I think it worked.

The best way to make this much easier is to make sure the dough is super super cold. I put mine the freezer before and half way through rolling as it made it easier to get the rabbits from the table to the baking trays – otherwise you end up with some very all-shapes-and-sizes kinda rabbits, which is sweet and endearing in it’s own way, but might not be what you’re looking for. You can also mix up the flavours in anyway you want when you’ve got the hang of the shaping. You could add spices or chocolate chips to the dough and/or dip the rabbits in melted chocolate and 100s + 1000s to jazz them up a bit!

Recipe

Makes 16

Time: 1 hour

Ingredients

  • 200g Butter
  • 200g Caster sugar
  • 1 Egg
  • 500g Plain flour
  • 25g Cocoa powder
  • 1 small bag of Mini eggs (around 16 eggs total)

Method

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 180C and line two baking trays with baking paper or Teflon sheets.
  2. Cream together the butter and the sugar in a large bowl with a wooden spoon until pale and creamy. Then add the egg and beat it in.
  3. Equally divide the mixture between two bowls (roughly 220g in each, but I’d recommend measuring the weight of all your dough then dividing it in 2). Add half the flour to each bowl and then add the cocoa powder to one. Mix everything in each bowl together until you have 2 smooth doughs.
  4. Wrap each dough in cling film and leave in the fridge for at least 30 minutes and then transfer it to a freezer 30 minutes before rolling.
  5. Roll one of the doughs out between two sheets of cling film to make a sheet roughly half the thickness of a pound coin. Then cut out as many gingerbread men as you can. Transfer these to your lined baking trays, fold the remaining dough back into a ball and re-roll. Repeat until you’ve used the dough as much as possible. Then do this for your other flavoured dough.
  6. Once you have all your gingerbread men place a mini egg in the ‘belly’ of each with the pointy end facing downwards (towards where the ears will be).
  7. Turn your gingerbread men upside down and from now on think of them as rabbits. Take the two arms and fold them up over the egg to secure it in place. Then take a cocktail stick and if needed chop off the heads of the ex-gingerbread men and place to one side (you can bake these ‘heads’ alongside the rabbits to make bite-sized biscuits).
  8. Using the same cocktail stick poke two eyes in the top of each rabbit to make some eyes and then press the flat of it into each ear to make indents.
  9. Bake in the oven for 10-15 minutes until just starting to go solid and brown a little. They’ll firm up a lot when out of the oven so don’t worry if they’re not crisp. Leave to cool and then enjoy!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Almond, Apricot and Ginger Bars

Almond, Apricot and Ginger Bars

By | | Comments 0 Comment

There’s something beautifully ironic about writers block becoming the key topic I seem to be writing about on here. For the past 3 weeks my tongue’s been as tied as my headphones after a day of being in the bottom of my bag and there’s no sign of that changing. Maybe it’s because life has taken over a bit recently, but there are very few things I can think of to say about snack bars.  It actually feels pretty inane to talk about a recipe through a long, sensual description in order to encourage you guys to make it anyway. Of course I can see the general point of it all, but when ice caps are melting, plastic is flooding the ocean, and God knows what is going on in my brain right now I’m just going to leave it at the classic: these are pretty tasty and pretty easy to make – so I’d recommend making them!

(Also small side point: since leaving veganuary I’ve decided to return to the land of vegetarianism and refined sugar-free-ness. That’s one of the reasons I love these so much – if you make them without the icing they’re 100% refined sugar free, and so even though they’re really sweet (and probably aren’t that good for you) they make a great treat whilst on this diet!)

Recipe

Serves 16

Time: 10 minutes, plus cooking time

Ingredients

  • 7 tbsp Unsalted butter
  • 155g Ground almonds
  • 200g Flaked almonds
  • 3 tsp Ground ginger
  • 130g Runny honey
  • 75g Dried apricots, roughly chopped
  • 1 Large egg
  • A large pinch of salt
  • 100g Icing sugar

Method

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 180˚C. Line a 25cm square tin with butter and baking paper.
  2. Melt the butter in a small pan. Put the almonds into a bowl with the ginger, honey, chopped dried apricots and egg, and then pour in the butter.
  3. Mix until everything is combined and then pour into the tin and smooth over to make an even layer. Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes until starting to go golden brown. Leave to cool whilst you make the icing.
  4. Put the icing sugar and ½ tsp water into a bowl and mix together to make a pourable icing. If you need more water add a little bit at a time until perfect.
  5. Drizzle the icing over the tray bake, slice into 16 squares and serve!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Chocolate Tacos

Chocolate Tacos

By | | Comments 0 Comment

Food should be two things: fun and delicious. I know it’s cheesy but I generally think of these as the two most important factors when planning and designing my bakes. If it gets a smile or a ‘hmmhmmm’ it’s done the job! Of course ending up with something looking good is always great as well, but it’s food not a painting – if it looks bad it won’t be hanging on your wall for years reminding you how bad it looks. That said, these look flipping amazing (if I say so myself) and they’re not that hard to make – if you can make pancakes you can defo make these!

These also have the benefit of being personalise-able to your hearts content which automatically makes them good in my books. Serve them on a tray like this, or serve the shells with a variety of toppings for people to decorate themselves. The plus side of using chocolate as a base is that it’ll go with pretty much anything so get creative, think fruit, nuts, sauces, sweets, ice creams and anything else you could possibly want!

Recipe

Makes 5

Time: 90 minutes

Ingredients

For the shells

  • 50g Plain flour
  • 30g Caster sugar
  • 20g Brown sugar
  • 1 tbsp Cocoa powder
  • Large pinch of salt
  • 1 Large egg white
  • 1 tbsp Melted butter
  • 30ml Whole milk
  • A few drops of vanilla extract

For the filling

  • 50g Milk chocolate, melted
  • 100g Chopped hazelnuts
  • A few scoops of Chocolate ice cream
  • Double cream (or squirty cream)
  • Fresh fruit (I went for bananas and strawberries)

Method

  1. Begin by making the taco shells. Put the flour, sugars, cocoa and salt into a large bowl and whisk together.
  2. In another bowl put the egg white, melted butter, milk and vanilla and whisk together.
  3. Pour the wet mixture into the dry mixture and whisk to make a smooth batter.
  4. Place a small frying pan over a medium heat. Lightly oil and then add about 1 tbsp batter to the pan. Smooth the mixture around the pan to make an even layer.
  5. Cook for a couple of minutes and then flip the taco over and cook for another couple of minutes on the other side.
  6. Cover a rolling pin in cling film. Take the taco shell out of the pan and carefully fold it over the rolling pin. Hold it in shape for about 10 seconds and then leave to cool whilst you repeat with the rest of the mixture.
  7. Once all your mixture is used up melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of gently simmering water.
  8. Dip the edge of one of the tacos in the melted chocolate and then dip the edge into a bowl of the chopped hazelnuts. Leave on a plate to set.
  9. When ready to serve put a couple of scoops of ice cream into each taco. Top with some squirty cream, fresh fruit, chopped nuts and any of the left over melted chocolate!

Thanks for reading!

Emma x
Kat’s Vegan Chocolate Cookies

Kat’s Vegan Chocolate Cookies

By | | Comments 0 Comment

In true Oxford style term is getting insanely intense and stressful; I have this toxic habit of over-committing myself and yet still being surprised when I suddenly hit a wall of stress a few weeks later! On the plus side I’m having a blast and loving every second, but as there’re no signs of anything quieting down in the near future I’m gonna have to keep relying on snacks to keep me going. One of my main go-to mood boosters are cookies because they’re so easy to snack on during rehearsals and they give a much needed sugar kick. I have this one friend who’s obsessed with cookies in a way worryingly similar to that of a crack addict – which I guess just goes to show how perfect they can be for stressful times! – and whilst I’m not quite that bad I’ll still never say no to a decent cookie.

This recipe was given to me by my friend (and fellow vegan for 1 week) Kat (hence Kat’s vegan cookies). I’ve never really used coconut oil before as it’s a bit on the pricey side to be a student staple, but it gives these a really gorgeous moistness and a slight coconut creamy overtone that works beautifully with the chocolate. Another wonder of pretty much any biscuit mix is that you can freeze the dough so you can bake however many you need whenever you need them. I find freezing batches of this cookie dough in large ice cube trays is perfect, because then you can just pop out however many blobs of dough you need as and when you need them.

Recipe

Makes 18

Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients

  • 112g Coconut oil
  • 70g Brown sugar
  • 70g White sugar
  • 1 tsp Vanilla extract
  • 125g Plain flour
  • 80g Cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp Baking powder
  • ¼ tsp Salt
  • 1 tbsp Dairy free milk (e.g soy or almond)

Method

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 180˚C. Then line two trays with baking paper.
  2. Cream the coconut oil with the sugars, using a wooden spoon in a large bowl until pale and creamy. Then Add the vanilla and mix it in.
  3. Sift the dry ingredients into the wet and then mix everything together until a soft crumbly dough forms.
  4. Add the dairy free milk and then mix again until the dough forms a smooth ball.
  5. Roll the dough into balls and place them on your lined baking trays, making sure they’re well spaced so they don’t spread into each other.
  6. Bake in the oven for about 15 minutes, until they’ve spread an are starting to crisp at the corners. They’ll firm up as they cool so you want the middle to still be a little squidgy.
  7. Take out the oven, leave to cool and then enjoy!

Thanks for reading!
Emma x