Cookies and Biscuits
There’s only one thing wrong with cookies you make at home: they disappear too fast! It’s a good job they’re simple and quick to make. Your kids can make them while you sit down with a cup of coffee and wait for your first sample.
There are a number of different methods for making cookies and biscuits and once you’ve mastered those you can vary the ingredients to suit yourself.
Chocolate Chip Cookies
What you need:- 6 oz butter
- 4 oz caster sugar
- 8 oz self-raising flour
- 4 oz chocolate chips
Preheat the oven to 180oC, gas mark 4. Grease 2 baking sheets.
Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Using an electric whisk is quickest.
Sieve the flour into the bowl and fold it in, using a metal spoon to ‘cut’, lift and fold the mixture.
Fold in the chocolate chips.
Roll the dough into small balls and place on the greased baking sheets. Flatten them slightly and leave room between for them to spread out.
Cook for about 15 minutes until lightly browned. Leave to cool and firm up on a cooling rack.
Oaty Cookies
What you need:- 4 oz butter, softened
- 4 oz caster sugar
- 1 egg
- 6 oz self-raising flour
- Pinch of salt
- 2 oz rolled oats
Preheat the oven to 180oC, gas mark 4. Grease 2 baking sheets.
Beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg and then fold in the sifted flour and salt to make a stiff dough.
Wet your hands and then roll the dough into small balls. Roll the balls in the oats and place, well-spaced, on the baking sheets. Flatten slightly. Cook for about 15 - 20 minutes.
Leave them on the baking tray to cool for a few minutes then move to a wire cooling tray.
Chocolate Wheels
What you need:- 6 oz plain flour
- Pinch of salt
- 3 oz margarine
- 1½ oz caster sugar
- A few drops of vanilla essence
- 1 egg, beaten
- 2 oz chocolate
Preheat the oven to 200oC, gas mark 6. Grease 2 baking sheets.
Sieve the flour and salt together into a bowl. Rub in the margarine, using your finger-tips, until you have a fine breadcrumb mixture. Stir in the sugar and mix to a dough with the egg and essence.
Roll out the dough onto a floured surface. Cut out cookies with a 5 cm cutter.
Place on the baking sheets and cook for about 10 minutes until golden. Allow to cool on a wire rack.
Melt the chocolate in the microwave or over a pan of boiling water. Take the bowl off the pan - or out of the microwave - before dipping the biscuit half-way into the chocolate. Leave to set before eating.
Coconut Cookies
What you need:- 2 egg whites
- 4 oz granulated sugar
- 8 oz desiccated coconut
Preheat the oven to 180oC, gas mark 4. Line 2 baking sheets with greased greaseproof paper.
To get egg whites, you need to separate the yolk from the white. Gently crack the egg shell and break it in half, holding it upright. Then, holding the egg sideways over a clean bowl, separate the 2 shell halves slightly so that the white can slip out. When most of it has slid into the bowl, hold the egg upright again and lift up the top shell. You should be left with the yolk in the bottom half. If there is still white in the shell, carefully toss the yolk back and for between the two shell halves, keeping them close together, so only the white drips out.
It’s best to separate each egg into a different bowl in case you make a mistake with the next one and get yolk into the bowl with the white.
Now you have the two egg whites in a large bowl and you whisk them until they’re stiff and dry. Add the coconut and sugar and stir well.
Drop teaspoonfuls of the mixture onto the greaseproof paper-lined baking sheets and cook for about 15 – 20 minutes. Allow to cool on a wire rack.
