Nutella Leaf Cookies

Hurry!!!! This is the 200th post of my blog and I'm so excited to share this with you all. You are all who made it possible, encouraging me to cook and post more recipes. I want to thank you all for all the love and encouragement, you have shown for my blog.

Lets celebrate with something simple but everyone's favourite. COOKIES!!!!! Yes, Cookies and that too made with NUTELLA!!!! Ha ha ha , I know I get all excited talking about nutella. This is something I can eat all day long, but at the same time I'm very health conscious. So little bit at a time, that's what made me think of something I can eat within the limit but has pure taste of nutella.

Idea is to make Nutella cookies without so many stuff going in there. No oil, no sugar  and no butter. Crispy and crunchy cookies. So just with 4 ingredients, I made these yumtastic cookies for evening tea. I'm now waiting for my darling daughter to come back from school and we can share our evening tea with these Nutella Leaf cookies.

Does the name sounds good. I love it, but you can shape them as you want and name them accordingly. Easiest recipe and yummiest cookies, is the theme of 200th post, so Thanks once again for all the love and encouragement. Presenting "Nutella Leaf Cookies". Try your hands on them and drop a comment with your feedback........Until Next Time, Happy Cooking Friends, Saumya

Ingredients:

Self Raising Flour                 - 1 cup
Nutella                                   - 1/3 cup
Milk                                       - 1 tblspoon
Nuts                                       - 1 tblspoon (Mixed / Hazelnut) Ground



Method:

Line a baking sheet with baking mat/parchment.
In a stand mixer/Bowl, combine the Nutella & flour until it's like crumbs.
With the mixer running, add the milk and nuts.
Take it out from mixer, and combine it to form dough.
This dough will give you 30 cookies.
I made 16 cookies and freeze rest of the dough.
Divide the dough into equal parts depending on the size.
The simple way to make cookies is to roll it out on a board and cut out the desired shapes from cookie cutter.
I wanted a bit of adventure so I made 16 equal portions of dough.
Shaped and Carved them like leaves.
Place all the cut/shaped cookies on the lined baking tray.

Preheat the oven to 180c. While oven is heating keep the cookie tray in the fridge.
Bake these Nutella cuties in preheated oven for 10-12 minutes, until crisp and just beginning to colour. Remove from the oven and transfer to wire racks to cool. Sorry about the lighting on the picture. It's a dull day.

Cookies are ready to serve with evening tea or as a snack for kids.
You can also sandwich them with Chocolate sauce, Nutella or Vanilla Buttercream.

Classic CheckerBoard Cookies

I've always been dreaming of baking, when I first started to cook on my own. I used to be a helper in my mum's kitchen, so honestly i never liked cooking. Once got married and settled into a foreign country, I've had to cook each meal on my own. I never liked outside food much, because that was not made for my taste buds.

Once I started to learn to cook different things, I found myself attracted towards baking. Baking used to be a monstrous job for me one year ago. Now things have changed, I started baking cookies, cakes, muffins and so on and to my surprise, I enjoy doing it. It's much easier than hob cooking sometimes.

So lets come to our to the title of this post, Checkerboard cookies. I've been dreaming of making them since long time. I've gone through many many recipes from other bloggers and most of them were made using eggs, which I don not use in my baking.

One recipe I stumbled up is from Linda of RotiAndRice blog. She explained it quite impressively with all the steps. Assembling the strips were the basic part I was scared of but she explained it very well in writing as well as in video, I made these cookies watching her video this morning, that simple It was. I'm still not perfect on them and need a lot of practice, but they look adorable :)

So here my friends is the recipe, adapted from Linda's blog, with some changes on my choice of size, shape and taste. Try making them and I'm sure you all will love eating them with tea or coffee. Let me know your feedback by dropping the comments below................. Until Next Time, Happy Cooking Friends, Saumya

Ingredients:

Vanilla Dough:

Unsalted Butter                       - 1/2 cup / 1 stick softened
Granulated Sugar                     - 1/3 cup
Plain Flour / APF                     - 1-1/4 cup
Vanilla extract                          - 2 tspoon

Chocolate Dough:

Unsalted Butter                       - 1/2 cup / 1 stick softened
Granulated Sugar                     - 1/3 cup
Plain Flour / APF                     - 1-1/4 cup
Cocoa Powder                          - 2 tblspoon
Orange Extract                         - 1/2 tspoon

Method:

For vanilla dough, cream butter and sugar together in a large bowl until well blended, about 2 minutes.

Now beat in vanilla extract.

Slowly mix in the flour on low speed.

Knead dough with hands to bring it together.
Turn dough onto a clean working surface.
Shape into a rectangle.

Wrap with cling film and chill for about 30 minutes.

For chocolate dough, again cream butter and sugar together in a large bowl until well blended, about 2 minutes.

Beat in the cocoa powder and orange extract.

Slowly mix in the flour on low speed.

Knead dough to bring it together.

Turn dough onto a clean working surface.
Shape into a rectangle.
Wrap with cling film and chill for about 30 minutes.

While the dough are chilling ,  Prepare a sheet of parchment or wax paper to shape the cookies.
Draw a 7inch x 7inch square in the middle of parchment or wax paper.

When both of the dough are chilled, remove from refrigerator.
Place a sheet of the parchment paper with the drawn side of the 7in x 7in square facing down on your
work surface.
Unwrap dough and place in the middle of the 7in x 7 inch square.
Then place a sheet of plastic wrap on the top of dough.

Roll out dough to the outline of the 7in x 7in square.

Use a knife or spatula to push dough into the square so as to minimize wastage.
Do the same for the chocolate flavor dough.

Remove the plastic wrap and cut the dough into three equal width slabs.

Place three slabs of dough, alternating vanilla and chocolate dough one on top of the other.

Gently press the slabs together, so that they stick together.

Cut each slab lengthwise into 3 strips of equal width.

Rearrange the strips of dough to create 2 slabs forming 9 small rectangles crosswise. Simply alternate the colours.

Wrap each slab with plastic and refrigerate for another 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 350°F (180°C).
Remove dough from refrigerator. Unwrap the dough and slice each log into ¼ inch thick slices crosswise.

Place onto nonstick baking sheet and bake for about 12 minutes. As there were more cookies than my baking tray can occupy, I freeze rest of the dough.

Remove and let cookies cool for 5 minutes before transferring onto a wire rack to cool completely.

These cookies can be stored in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks. I made another batch of 15 and stored the cookies in a jar to treat my kids again with their favourite milk shake. 

Recipe with thanks adapted from Roti n Rice at http://www.rotinrice.com/2014/10/checkerboardcookies/. I did some changes according to my taste and choice of size of the cookies.

Microwave Eggless Chocolate Cake

One of the day, your little one starts screaming for chocolate cake and you don't really have time to wait for another 40 minutes for preparations and baking. You go for this quick, easy and ready in minutes chocolate cake. I tried it first time and It is already a hit in my house.

To my surprise, the cake turned out be the most gorgeous, moist and spongy cake. I never expected it to be like that because of microwave baking. This trial microwave cake made me a big fan of microwave cake baking.

I have already started making list of cake recipes, I can do in Microwave. The less time taking was the best thing attracted me towards microwave cake baking. Its a HIT HIT HIT!!!!!!!!

I've been baking cakes for quite a bit of time in my Kitchen, but never tried this method and believe me friends, Its an awesome method. I 'm sure even for once, you will try making it.  Don't forget to comment below :) Until next time.......Happy Cooking Friends, Saumya

Ingredients:

Self Raising Flour                  - 1 cup
Baking Powder                       - 1/2 tspoon
Baking Soda                           - 1/4 tspoon
Salt                                         - 1 pinch
Cocoa Powder                        - 2 tblspoon
Oil                                          - 1/4 cup
Sugar                                      - 2 tblspoon
Vanilla                                    - 1 tspoon
Condensed Milk                     - 1/2 tin (100grms)
Sour Cream                             - 1/2 cup
Water                                      - 1/2 cup


Method:

Grease a glass dish (Microwave safe).
Mix sour-cream and water together, keep aside.
Sieve Flour, baking powder, soda, salt and cocoa powder in a mixing bowl.
Mix Oil, Vanilla, condensed milk and sugar in other bowl. Whisk to dissolve sugar and fluff the wet ingredients.
Make a well in between dry ingredients, add wet ingredients.
Start folding the ingredients together.
Slowly add the sour-cream to make the batter a bit loose but on thicker side.
Once all the sour-cream+water is added, whisk well to avoid any dry lumps.
Pour the batter into greased microwave dish.
Bake on high , 100 percent power for 6-7 minutes .
Try not to go for dome shape deep bowls, you get sides cooked early and middle takes time.
Take a flat dish, which has equal depth and sides.
You have a gorgeously moisten and spongy cake ever.
I was surprised to see the cake once it was cooked, I never expected it to be so soft and spongy in microwave and in just 6 minutes.
Top the cake with your choice of glazing or frosting.

Wholewheat Chocolate Almond Biscuits

Ingredients:

Wholewheat Flour             - 1 cup
Cane Sugar                        - 1/2 cup
Almonds crushed               - 1/2 cup
Butter                                 - 1/2 cup soft/room temperature
Salt                                     - 1 pinch
Milk                                    - 2 tspoon
Vanilla Essence                  - 1 tspoon
Melted Milk Chocolate      - 2 tblspoon

Method:

Preheat the oven to 180c. Line a baking tray.
Take all the ingredients in a deep mixing bowl.
Mix well  and make a soft dough.

Roll out the dough over floured surface.

Cut Fun shapes out of the dough.

Place the Biscuits/Cookie shapes on the baking tray.

Bake them on 180c for 18-20 minutes or until they turn golden.

You can also dip these Biscuits/Cookies in the melted chocolate and keep in the fridge until the chocolate is set. I decorated them with milk chocolate, My kids love them this way.