Ginger Cookies

When we were kids we used to get these ginger biscuits with the word BIL imprinted on it from most probably Britannia. I loved those biscuits and since we are a little away from inventing the time machine to go back and get those, I make my own. Try them out, they make wonderful accompaniment to some great Darjeeling tea to warm up your cool evenings.

Ingredients

• 2 and 1/2 cup all purpose flour
• 150 gm. unsalted butter
• 1/4 cup honey                 
• 100 gm. dark brown cane sugar
• 100 gm. cane sugar (White)
• 2 tbsp. freshly squeezed ginger juice ( I grate around 2 inch fresh ginger root and squeeze out the juice)
• 2 tbsp. lemon zest
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 cup granulated white sugar for garnishing

NOTE: If you don’t want to add fresh ginger juice you can use 1 tbsp. ginger powder

Procedure

Preheat oven to 350F.

In a bowl melt butter and allow it to cool down a little. To it add honey, egg, lemon zest and ginger juice. Stir it well to mix them well.

In another bowl sift flour with baking soda. Add two types of sugar to it and give a nice mix.

Now slowly add this flour mixture little at a time to the liquid mixture to form a dough. Cover the dough with a cling wrap and keep it in the refrigerator for an hour.

In a medium sized bowl take half a cup of white granulated sugar and keep handy. Now make small lemon sized balls from the dough and roll it over the sugar coating them thoroughly.

Place them on a baking sheet keeping spacing about 1.5 inches apart. Flatten each of them with your palm and bake them for about 10 – 12 minutes. The cookies will be firm with a little soft centers. Take them out of the oven and cool them on a wire rack.

Vanilla Cookie

One of our dear friends gave us a customized “Basu families Jar of yumminess” as a present. It now occupies the central position of our drawing room. Unfortunately it sometimes disappoints the little ones as it remains empty. I thought of rectifying it for the holidays by filling them with simple Vanilla Cookies.

Ingredients

• 1and 3/4 cup all purpose flour
• 100gms. unsalted butter
• 100gms. powdered sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 10 – 15 almonds and pistachio roughly chopped

Procedure

Heat oven to 375 F. In a mixing bowl the butter at room temperature and sugar. Cream it with a electric mixture. Add egg, vanilla extract and continue beating.

Fold the mixture in refined flour and mix well. Scrape the sides when required.

Put the mixture in a piping bag fitted with your favorite nozzle. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and pipe out cookies on it. Sprinkle chopped almond and pistachio.

You can give them a shape of your choice by using your hand as well.

Bake for 15 – 20 minutes. Remove from oven and cool it off. Store it in an airtight jar.

Icebox Cookies

This lovely cookies dotted with red candied cherries are ideal for Christmas. The good thing about these cookies is that you can make the cookie dough in advance and store it in the refrigerator for upto a week and bake it fresh when needed.

My husband really liked them and wanted a batch for his office, so some of my readers who work with him as well can look forward to these soon :)

Ingredients

• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 1 cup white granulated sugar
• 1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 tsp.baking powder
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 cup candied red cherries
• 1/4 tsp. salt

Procedure

In a big bowl beat butter and sugar till they are light and fluffy. It takes almost 3 – 4 minutes with a electric hand mixer. Add egg and vanilla extract to it and beat well until incorporated.

In another bowl mix all dry ingredients and sift them. Gradually add this dry mixture to the butter until a dough forms. At the end add the cherries and stir in until distributed evenly in the dough.

Divide the dough into three equal portions and shape each of them into logs and wrap in wax paper. Tap each of the wrapped log on the counter to create a square log. Chill in the refrigerator until firm.

Heat oven to 350F. Take the logs 15 minutes before you bake them and slice with a sharp knife.Bake for 14 – 15 minutes, and your icebox cookies are ready..  

Spicy Jeera Biscuit

Bunch of my recent posts are on biscuits and other snacks because we are just coming out of winter holidays. Being at home in this bitter cold (by the way it’s –6 Celsius today) means having friends over, watching lots of movies and playing indoor games. All of these with copious amount of snacking and munching. To avoid falling onto more unhealthy stuff like potatoe-chips and popcorns, I make a lot of healthy biscuits and keep them in boxes around the house.

This is a slightly grown up version of biscuits as I added bunch of spices and chili-fakes to combat the cold.

Ingredients

1. 1/3 cup all purpose flour ( Maida )
2. 1/3 cup whole wheat flour ( Atta )
3. 1/3 cup semolina ( Sooji )
4. 1tsp. salt
5. 1tsp. sugar
6. 1tsp. baking powder
7. 2tsp. roasted cumin seeds
8. 1tsp. chili flakes
9. 2tsp. chopped fresh cilantro ( Coriander Leaves )
10. 4tbsp. canola oil ( You can use any other vegetable oil )
11. 1/3 cup butter milk

Procedure

Pre heat oven at 350F

In a bowl soak semolina in buttermilk and keep for 15 minutes.

In  another bowl sift flour with baking powder. Now add other dry ingredients to it and mix until well combined. Drizzle oil over it and mix it with your finger tips till the mixture looks like bread crumb. Add chopped cilantro to it and mix well.

Now add soaked semolina to it and knead it to make a soft pliable dough. If needed you may add little water to it.

Roll the dough on a floured surface. Roll it out till it is fairly thin. The dough is sticky and clings to the rolling pin. So one trick I use, is to place the dough inside cling-films and then rolling them.

Now using a round cutter cut out small rounds from the dough. Repeat till the dough is all used up.

Place the round cut outs on a baking sheet and bake them or 20 – 25 minutes till the sides turn golden.

Allow them to cool under room temperature before you store them.