IMBB 10 - Cookie Swap : Sunset Delight

So there I was on a tranquil, serene Sunday afternoon, sitting on the kitchen backdoor steps, watching the sun begin to dip into the horizon, throwing its last fiery rays across the sky in swaths of oranges, reds and pinks. The warm glow of sunset bounced happily off the glistening white surfaces of the balls of cookies sitting in the champagne glass that I held in my hand. One of our resident squirrels watched me from its perch on the garden wall, perhaps wishing to share in my bounty. But it was too shy, and soon skipped off with long tail bobbing. A small smile tugged at the corners of my lips as I contentedly popped one cookie after another into my mouth, letting each dissolve gently in a sugary sweet dance across my tongue. My heart whispered a soft sigh of thanks and gratitude to Jennifer for precipitating this stolen moment of serendipity.

You see, it was her idea to have a cookie swap for IMBB 10. I had missed her previous two installments of SHF (that’s Sugar High Fridays, if you’re wondering) -- either because I found out too late, or because Life had me gripped tightly in its frenetic pace -- but I wasn’t about to miss this IMBB which she is hosting. Besides, how could I turn down a chance to make cookies?

But cookies, perhaps due to the stronger British influence, do not feature very prominently in my idea of Christmas -- a festival I associate more with mince pies (Christmas just isn’t Christmas without mince pies, in my opinion), rich fruit cakes, yule logs and plum puddings. Yet, it matters not. Chinese New Year follows hot on the heels of Christmas and the Gregorian New Year, and that is a celebration where there must be, as a matter of course, rivers of cookies of all shapes, sizes, tastes and textures. And so what better opportunity than this to get a head-start on recipe experimentation for the early-February festival?

Almost as soon as I heard about the theme for IMBB 10, I already knew which cookie I wanted to try… a cookie that is, as I recently realized, found in many different cultures; various versions of it go by such monikers as Mexican Wedding Cakes, Russian Tea Cakes, Snowballs (how’s that for a Christmas-sounding name) or… quite simply “white balls”. In South East Asia, and more specifically, in East Malaysia and Brunei, we have a variant called the kueh mur (click and scroll down until you see round white balls), which is a must-have for both the Muslim Hari Raya and the Chinese New Year. And so, this cookie seems rather appropriate for this IMBB -- it can be Christmas-y or Chinese New Year-y according to whim.

How I came upon an enlightened (read: lower fat) version of the recipe was also a stroke of serendipity. I was walking through Borders to get to my car. I happened to walk through (not past… it’s funny how we sometimes feel the need to not take the shortest route from point A to point B! ) the cookbook section. Inexplicably, my eye caught sight of a very slim volume tucked in amongst hundreds of other bigger, bulkier, more prominently displayed cookbooks. I stopped, pulled it out, flipped through it for like 20 seconds, and proceeded to pay for it. That was it. And so I ended up buying “One Smart Cookie” (I just love that title) by Julie Van Rosendaal, a Canadian author (how appropriate, no?).

In her book, Julie calls these cookies Russian Tea Cakes, but mentions in the head-note that they are also know as Mexican Wedding Cakes ; to me, they look rather like kueh mur. I have been looking, for the longest time, for a way to lighten the artery-clogging recipe for kueh mur, as well as for a more hassle-free way of making them too.

This particular recipe seems almost perfect -- it doesn’t require me to stand in front of the stove dry-frying the flour until my arms drop off; it uses very little butter (using cornstarch instead to give the cookies their characteristic melt-in-your-mouth texture -- so says the head-note); plus, it calls for the use of nuts, which I figure will lend incredible aromas to the cookies.

Trying out the inaugural recipe from any new cookbook is usually an iffy business, especially from an author I have never heard of before, and from a book that I bought on a whim (not that that is a bad thing at all, of course; I have found many a cookbook gem that way) -- I’m never sure what to expect, and the results are usually either stunningly good or shockingly ‘bleh’, with the occasional “okay, but who cares”.

These cookies from Julie’s recipe are fun (and easy) to make, and festive to look at. Tastewise… I’ll get to that after the recipe…

Russian Tea Cakes - Mexican Wedding Cakes
[from “One Smart Cookie” by Julie Van Rosendaal]

¾ cup (120g) almonds *
1½ cups (175g) cake flour **
¼ cup (30g) cornstarch ***
¼ tsp salt
1/3 cup (80g) butter (not margarine), softened
1 tbsp canola oil
¾ cup (90g) confectioners’ (icing) sugar
2 tbsp milk ****
1 tsp vanilla
¼ to 1/3 cup (30-40g) confectioners’ (icing) sugar, for rolling

* I used almonds, but the recipe allows for pecans, hazelnuts, walnuts or a combination of these.

** Although the recipe calls for regular plain flour, I opted to use cake flour, to help keep the crumb very tender. I also chose not to make any compensation and used the same volume of cake flour as for plain flour. If you are using the latter, 1½ cups will weigh in at around 210g instead of 175g as for cake flour.

*** This is the same as what is commonly called “cornflour” in the UK and in this part of the world ; it is, however, very different from what the Americans call “corn flour” which is finely ground cornmeal, and which should not be used in this recipe.

**** I used 1.5% milk.

• Preheat oven to 350F or 175C.

• Toast nuts until lightly browned and fragrant. Cool and finely chop in a food processor.

• In a medium bowl, combine flour, cornstarch, salt and nuts; set aside.

• In a large bowl, beat butter, oil and ¾ cup confectioners’ sugar with an electric mixer for 2 minutes, until light and fluffy. Add milk and vanilla and beat until smooth.

• Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture, and stir by hand just until the dough comes together.

• Shape the dough into 1” to 1¼” balls (I made them into smaller ¾” ones that can be popped whole into the mouth), and place 1”-2” apart on an ungreased cookie sheet.

• Bake for 15-18 minutes (12-14 minutes if making smaller balls) until golden on the bottoms.

• Meanwhile, place additional confectioners’ sugar in a shallow dish. Remove cooked cookies from the cookie sheet and immediately roll in the sugar while they are still hot, then place on a wire rack to cool. (I like my cookies evenly coated with sugar and snowy white in appearance, so I roll them a second time in sugar after they have cooled.)

• (I managed to get 66 small cookies out of the recipe, which originally allows for 2 dozen cookies from one batch of dough.)

So, how do they taste?

Not brilliant, unfortunately. The texture is fairly tender, though I won’t exactly call it “melt-in-the-mouth” tender. The crumb is very nicely refined and smooth though. The initial flavor notes of the cookie are rather pleasant -- that sugary zip as the confectioners’ sugar hits the tongue. However, this is then followed by a certain blandness; there is nary a taste of the almonds -- nothing nutty at all about these cookies. Even if left to stand for the night (and a couple of days after that), the almond flavors fail to develop and intensify. Perhaps peanuts (or some other stronger tasting nuts) may be a better option?

But it is the aftertaste that unsettles me -- this almost pasty, cornflour-y aftertaste, which I find rather disconcerting. I’m not sure why there is this aftertaste at all; I’ve seen many cookie recipes that use cornstarch as a crumb tenderizer and I have not experienced this pastiness in flavor before. Perhaps it is the combination of cornstarch with confectioners’ sugar (which in itself is made up of around 3% cornstarch) that compounds the problem -- too much cornstarch and not enough sweetness from the confectioners’ sugar to counter-balance it. I think caster sugar that has been quickly pulsed a few times in the food processor may do a better job -- it will be fine enough to melt quickly during baking (as seems to be the author’s intention in using confectioners’ sugar) and to still give a velvety smooth texture to the cookies.

So sadly, while the cookies are wonderful to look at (and oh how temptingly gorgeous and festive they look in the champagne glass), their taste do not quite match up to their appearance. Still, they are a lot of fun to make, and I think with some tweaking, the recipe can work very well.

For me, the best part of this cookie-swap has been the chance to start getting into the festive mood, and start thinking about all the goodies I want to cook and bake for Christmas and New Year’s.

So, thanks Jennifer for a great IMBB theme! And a toast to all the great cookie recipes that I know will be rolling in ; I can’t wait to read them all.

Copyright © 2004 Renee Kho. All Rights Reserved.
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