Bond does Milan...

But first the obligatory lines...

The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

And now on to Bond, James Bond, Britain's finest - now relegated to baking...


"You've got two cookies to make Bond." M snarled at him.

Bond was rather mesmerised, seeing M wearing a black cocktail dress. She always looked so matronly but now she actually looked semi decent. He snuck a peak at her cleavage and then suddenly felt slightly nauseous as he realised he was actually having nasty thoughts of M... terrible, terrible! He really must be getting old.

"Ummm.. cookies M? Dont you mean biscuits?" Bond replied, looking quickly at the floor to avert his eyes from her cleavage which seemed to draw his eyes to them like a magnet.

"Yes, Biscuits to us Brits but you DO know how the Yanks always try and be different. What we know as Biscuits, they call Cookies and what they call Biscuits, we know as Scones. All very confusing really. They confuse things even more by not following the Metric system. Think about it James... part of the reason why the American girls love you so much is because they assume you are talking inches instead of centimetres."

"Centimeters or inches M, it really doesnt matter. Its what you do with it that..."

"Oh Shut up James! Here. Two cookies, err.. biscuits. Go do what you are supposed to do." M held out a dossier.


Bond's heart fell. He sooo hated baking biscuits. He loved eating them, but he just hated baking them. All that fuss in piping out the dough, baking for a short spell then repeating the whole process always got his knickers into a knot. Although, he quite rightly reminded himself, knickers were usually worn by women. He finally understood the emphasis of knickers in the traditional British saying of "to get one's knickers in a knot, meaning to get flustered or agitated. It was knickers and not underpants as it was simply because it was women that always got flustered and agitated - especially around him....and then he so enjoyed unknotting the knot in their knickers.

"Your mind wandering again Bond?" M queried.

Bond snapped out of his reverie and reached out to take the dossier from M. "Blasted biscuits." he mumbled quietly to himself as he briefly wondered if M had Her knickers in a knot...

Bond looked through the dossier in detail. His frown turned to a scowl as he read that he was required to make Chocolate Covered Marshmallow cookies. Not quite his cup of tea and the bigger problem was that it really wouldnt even GO with a cup of tea. Certainly not Earl Grey or even English Breakfast for that matter. His eyes lit up a little as he saw that the second recipe was for a Milano Biscuit.

Aaaah!! Milano! He recalled that lovely Italian agent, Francesca Sofia Giada Alessandra Valentina del Piero. He smiled at how he thought he would be meeting 5 women and how it had turned out to be one woman with 5 names. She was one of the most beautiful women he had ever met let alone ever laid eyes upon and not to mention laying his hands all over and of course laying in the other sense of the word... her knickers were pretty too - definitely no knots in them.

Then there was the time that they went to watch AC Milan playing at the San Siro but he hardly remembered the match - he was too enamoured with Dolcezza (that was his pet name for her that meant Honey) in their very own corporate box. Good thing too as he found Italian football so boringly boring. The best thing about the Corporate Box though were the Milano biscuits that he had eaten.

It was only when he returned back to England that he realised that Milano cookies are a trademarked dessert manufactured by Pepperidge Farm as part of their series of "European" cookies. There is really nothing Italian or Milanish about the Milano biscuit. Further checks showed that the Milano was created as a result of Pepperidge Farm's original cookie concept, the Naples, which was a single vanilla wafer cookie with dark chocolate filling topping it that would often get stuck together when shipped to and sold in warmer climates. The company resolved the problem by sandwiching Naples cookies together, creating the new Milano variety.

Bond returned to the dossier and his eyes lit up at the very last line that read:
* You can either do both recipes or just choose one.

"Bully for you Nicole!" Bond punched his fist into the air, happy that he only had to make one biscuit. Now that Milano would go really well with English Breakfast as well as Earl Grey. Why for that matter even Prince of Wales and Lemon Scented would go very well with the Milano. Ahhh... nothing like a good cup of Twinings Tea!

As usual, Bond woke up early on a Saturday morning to do the challenge. He decided he was going to half the recipe and just make a small batch and that is exactly what he did. Everything mixed up rather well and he followed the recipe exactly as it was written. Bond felt that the mix was a little thin but he plodded on anyway. he used a large tray to pipe out his dough and stuck it into the oven. Alas, when the biscuits came out, they were very thin. Almost to the point of looking and tasting like Tuilles. Further, the biscuits were extremely sweet. The children that he offered the biscuits to were not impressed and thumbed their noses at him.

Bond was disappointed. Very, very disappointed.

Nonetheless, the next weekend, he decided he was going to try and make it again. Again he halved the recipe but this time, he added a little bit more flour and also cut down on the sugar. This time the dough seemed a little firmer. Bond piped out nice strips onto his baking sheet and let the biscuits bake for about 15 minutes. This seemed to work a charm and the biscuits came out looking decent. They didnt taste nearly as sweet either.


With excitement growing, Bond melted the chocolate and when the biscuits had cooled, smeared the chocolate on and sandwhiched the biscutis together. They certainly looked like Milano's but did they Taste like Milano's?



They were very good indeed! Perhaps not as nice as the professional Pepperidge Farm ones but still bloody good!

"Well done old chap" Bond smiled to himself as he sunk his teeth into a Milano and thought of Francesca Sofia Giada Alessandra Valentina del Piero...



and so ends another installment of Bond, James Bond, Britain's finest!

How did my wonderful food tasters like it?

My Principessa loved it as you can well see! My son enjoyed it as well and both of them loved the dark chocolate melding with the slight lemon flavour of the biscuit. The biscuits didnt last long and I was left wondering if I should have made a full batch instead of being stingy and just doing the half measure...


Thanks Nicole for a great challenge that although failed at first, turned out really well on the second try!

Milan Cookies
Recipe courtesy Gale Gand, from Food Network website (changes in parentheses)

Prep Time: 20 min
Inactive Prep Time: 0 min
Cook Time: 1 hr 0 min
Serves: about 3 dozen cookies

• 170grams unsalted butter, softened
• 2 1/2 cups (2 cups) powdered sugar
• 7/8 cup egg whites from about 6 eggs
• 2 tablespoons vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoons lemon extract
• 1 1/2 cups (1 3/4 cups) all purpose flour
• Cookie filling, recipe follows

Cookie filling:
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 8 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 1 orange, zested

1. In a mixer with paddle attachment cream the butter and the sugar.
2. Add the egg whites gradually and then mix in the vanilla and lemon extracts.
3. Add the flour and mix until just well mixed.
4. With a small (1/4-inch) plain tip, pipe 1-inch sections of batter onto a parchment-lined sheet pan, spacing them 2 inches apart as they spread.
5. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 10 (15)minutes or until light golden brown around the edges. Let cool on the pan.
6. While waiting for the cookies to cool, in a small saucepan over medium flame, scald cream.
7. Pour hot cream over chocolate in a bowl, whisk to melt chocolate, add zest and blend well.
8. Set aside to cool (the mixture will thicken as it cools).
9. Spread a thin amount of the filling onto the flat side of a cookie while the filling is still soft and press the flat side of a second cookie on top.
10. Repeat with the remainder of the cookies.

Rum Chocolate Biscuit Pudding - and the cooking influences in my life

It is my Mother, who really was the first person to introduce me to how much fun I could have in the kitchen, who built the foundation for a lot of my recipes. As a working mother - she was a teacher, she still found time to delight us with all manners of curries, pasta, meatloaf, casseroles, stews, cakes and desserts. Meals were never a boring affair at our house and it was Mom that taught us all how to always try new foods.

The Lovely Wife, of course, is the one that has spurred me on to greater heights. She is the one that has made me expand my repertoire. The kids too have played their part in expanding my culinary skills and just like I have fond memories of my mother experimenting with new flavours in the kitchen and exposing us to different cuisines, I too hope that my own children will have similar memories of me.

Jamie Oliver always goes on about his wife Jules - but not many people know that I have my own Jules - my Aunty Julie. Aunty Jules is my father's third sister. He is the only boy in a family of four girls. Aunty Julie was always the sweet, demure Aunt. Full of smiles and cuddles with a little mischief thrown in. She was also the Dessert Queen. Oh my! The desserts Aunty Jules would throw together were nothing short of magnificent. We kids all thouhgt she was nothing short of brilliant with the desserts she would come up with.

One of her all time favourites - and ours - was this Rum Chocolate Biscuit Pudding. When I started to make desserts of my own, I asked her for this recipe and she happily passed it on to me.


I have to admit that I was surprised at how simple this was and I made some further experimentation on it. One of the things I did differently was to increase the amount of chocolate as well as add in some cocoa. I use almonds rather than cashew nuts and I melt the chocolate with all the cream rather than the original recipe that calls for half the cream to be melted with the chocolate. The most important change I have made, I think, is to mix the egg yolks together with the warm chocalate - so that the egg at least cooks a little.

So...after sufficient modification, I have claimed it as my own recipe!





This is what I do.

Ingredients
1/2 Cup Butter (125g)
3/4 Cup Castor Sugar
350ml Unsweetened Cream
2 Eggs (separated)
150gm Dark Chocolate
2 Tablespoons Cocoa
1/2 - 1 cup Chopped Cashews (or Almonds)
1 packet Marie Biscuits
1 cup milk
Brandy or Rum (Optional - I use liberal amounts - 4 to 6 tablespoons!!)


Method
Separate eggs, ensuring that egg whites have no yolk.
Melt chocolate with the cream over a slow fire. Ensure cream does not boil. Beat in egg yolks quickly. Leave to cool. Once cool, whip till slightly thick but not stiff.
Cream butter and 1/2 the sugar. Add in chocolate mixture and sifted cocoa. Add Rum (dependent on your alcoholic tendencies!)
Whisk egg whites till they peak and then add remaining sugar, whisking till nice and thick. Fold in egg whites to chocolate mixture. Stir in 75% of nuts.
Dip Marie Biscuits into milk (to soften slightly) and line a tray with one layer of biscuits. Cover biscuits with layer of mixture. Alternate with layers of biscuits and mixture (with final layer being mixture)
Sprinkle remaining nuts on top (this just makes it look good)
Chill for at least 3 hours but preferably overnight.

This is a very rich and decadent dessert that will be a definite crowd pleaser. I loved it as a child and I love it even more now - all thanks to my wonderful Aunty Jules!

Vanilla Kipferin

One of The Lovely Wife's favourite cookbooks comes from Malaysia's very own celebrity Chef. Say goodbye to Jamie Oliver, wave away Nigella Lawson (even if she IS wearing a slinky nightgown...) and say hello to Wan Ismail better known as Chef Wan!

I like Chef Wan as well. His cooking shows are a hoot to watch! He has a great personality while he talks a mile a minute. His recipes are also rather good in that (so far at least), they have all turned out well with a minimum of fuss.

So enough about my plug on Chef Wan, this post is really about the Vanilla Kipferin's that The Lovely Wife baked some time ago - for Christmas actually!



These lovely cookies are cruncy, nutty goodness and the crescent shape gives it some added 'personality'. Huh? Biscuits with personality?? I think you know what I mean. Apparently these biscuits are popular in Austria and Switzerland - especially at Christmas time. Also, it appears that because of their shape, they are sometimes known as Moon Crescent biscuits. Somehow, that doesnt surprise me!

The recipe comes from Chef Wan's Sweet Treats and goes like this:.

210g all purpose flour
70g ground almods
50g castor sugar
180g cold, unsalted butter, vut into small pieces
2 egg yolks
icing sugar for dusting

Method
1. Combine flour, almonds and sugar in a bowl. Cut in cold butter until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Add egg yolks and from the dough into a ball. Chill for an hour
2. Roll the dough into marbles by hand then form into crescents. Bake at 180C for about 8 minutes or till golden.


Dust with icing sugar.



Very pretty biscuits and very tasty too! The kids helped out with shaping the biscuits and had a lot of fun doing it. Nothing better for wholesome family fun than cooking and baking in the kitchen - although this time, I readily admit, the fun was had without me!!

Oatmeal Biscuits / Oatmeal Cookies

Baking is always a lot of fun but baking with the Children is so much More Fun! The Lovely Wife is the Cookie expert in the house. Sure, I make cookies too but with far less frequency than the wife. This is partly due to my impatience with having to shape / drop the cookies on to the trays and then bake them in many batches. But I do so love to whip up a cookie mix and then leave the baking to someone else!!



Incidentally, did you know that in Commonwealth countries, cookies are actually known as biscuits while in the USA, biscuits refer to a type of bread - most commonly small breads made without yeast, also know as quickbreads. As language has evolved, cookie generally refers to the softer, chewy kind of biscuit.

In my home however, we use the term biscuit and cookie interchangeably whereas by right, it should be Biscuit, since we have a colonial past, speak English (rather than American!) use Metric measurements, drive on the left side of the road and spell using the British system( you know colour, organise, centre... to name just a few). Nonetheless with the influence of television, I can't very well tell my kids that the Cookie Monster should be the Biscuit Monster can I? Then it would have to be "B is for Biscuit, good enough for me.." rather than "C is for cookie, good enough for me...."

Heck! Even I grew up on Sesame Street and the Cookie Monster. I used to wonder from a very early age what the difference between cookies and biscuits are and coulnd't really accept that it was just a language/cultural thing. I then used to wonder why we eat Beef instead of Cow, Pork instead of Pig but we eat Lamb, Chicken and Duck.

This explains why I still spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about the unnecessary. My friends and relatives still make fun of me for this reason but I see nothing wrong with an inquisitive mind and this inquisitiveness seems to have rubbed of a little on my two kids. I guess it's true that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

Anyway, getting back on track, these biscuits were made by my wife and kids back in November. My son loves taking biscuits for his snack time at kindergarten and he loves nothing better than Mummy's home made biscuits.

Interesting story. Early in the year, he took some of my Chocolate Brownies to kindergarten and shared some with his teacher and classmates. The teacher asked my son "The brownies are very nice, did Mummy make them?" My son replied that it was actually Daddy that made the brownies and that Daddy is the one that makes the cakes at home.

A few weeks later, my son started to take the Lovely Wifes home made biscuits to kindy for his snack time. The teacher then asked him "Did Daddy make these too?". My son explained that Mummy made the biscuits and not Daddy. The teacher then quipped "Oh, so Mummy has become clever now."

The story is much funnier when it's told in person and even more so when my son tells it......

Anyhoo. These are the Oatmeal Cookies the Lovely Wife likes to make and that the kids love to eat. This is the first time that they helped in the making of the biscuits and they had a lot of fun with it.




The recipe comes from Le Cordon Bleu Home Collection - Biscuits. The Lovely Wife loves the Cordon Bleu collection and the recipe is as follows:

Ingredients
125g plain flour
1/2 tsp sodium bicarbonate
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
100g brown sugar
125g castor sugar
125g unsalted butter
1 egg lightly beaten
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 tbsp milk
1 tsp grated orange rind
160g rolled oats
125g raisins

Method
Preheat oven to 180C. Line baking trays with bakingpaper. Sift together flour, sodium bicarb, bakingpowder and salt.
Cream together the sugars and butter. Add the egg, vanilla and milk and beat till smooth. Sift in the sifted ingredients and mix well. Stir in grated orange rind, then the oats and raisins.
Scoop up balls of the dough with a tablespoon and drop on the prepared trays. Space them about 5cm apart.

Bake for 10-12 minutes or until just brown.
Remove from baking trays and let cool on a wire rack.



The kids really enjoyed baking cookies and are now looking forward to helping to bake all the cakes and biscuits for Christmas!

Cookie Decorating with the Kids

Phew! What a day! In fact, what a weekend! We did a Whole lot of cooking this weekend and finished off Sunday with my wife baking some cookies. We used the lovely set of cookie cutters that we bought not too long ago. There are some lovely shapes in the set including dinosaurs and lots of other animals. We made some glaze icing in a variety of colours for the children to decorate the cookies - anyway they wanted too! It was really Messy, but it was a whole lot of fun!

Here are some of the cookies they decorated.

Chocolate Cookies or Homemade Oreos without the cream

Both Michael and Sarah love Oreos and so I thought I'd see if I could make them homemade Oreo cookies - minus the cream of course. I surfed the web for recipes and found this one. I made a few alterations and the cookie turned out rather well. Depending on how thin you make the cookies and the length of time in the oven, gives you a slightly chewy or crispy 'Oreo'. I prefer them slightly thicker and thus a little chewy.

Since Michael likes to take cookies to kindergarten, we bought a nice set of cookie cutters that make lovely big cookies. As they often say, the proof of the pudding is in the eating - and these cookies passed the test. Mike and Sarah absolutely love them!!

The cookies also taste delicious with vanilla ice cream!

The recipe

Ingredients

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons castor sugar
6 ounces butter (salted)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 tablespoon water
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups flour
3/4 cup good quality cocoa powder


Method
Cream sugar and butter.
Add the salt, egg, water, and vanilla and beat until smooth.
Beat in sifted flour and cocoa until well combined (the dough will be stiff)
Roll the dough into small balls. Place the balls on baking paper/greasproff paper/lightly greased cookie sheets and flatten each ball until nice and round. To get a nice round, use the bottom of a glass dipped in cocoa powder. (Note that too much cocoa left over on the biscuit gives a moist, bitter cookie as the cocoa tends to melt a bit in the oven)
You may also use a cookie stamp and cut out shapes.
To get a nice crisp cookie, it’s important to press them thin. For a chewier cookie, let them be a little thicker. Too thin and the cookies will burn. Too thick and they will be chewy. Try out a few first to see what you like.
Place the baking sheets in the refrigerator to chill the dough for 30 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C. Bake the cookies for 18-20 minutes.
Remove the cookies from the baking pans and cool them completely on a wire rack.

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