Gingerbread greetings

We made this just before Christmas and it's been gracing the windowsill in the kitchen throughout the holidays. I used a traditional Swedish recipe for gingerbread biscuits which is crisp and buttery with lots of Christmassy flavour. Recipe to come.

The baked gingerbread.






Decorated and ready for assembly.




It was easier than it looks.

Review: Simple Pleasures - The Free Range Cook

She's New Zealand's leading celebrity chef, stars in her own cooking series and is a passionate advocate for using seasonal ingredients. Annabel Langbein is back with her 19th cookbook, Simple Pleasures: The Free Range Cook. It's another no fuss, entertaining type food book and at first glance it's lovely. Big mouthwatering pictures, easy read text and simple create at home recipes.

At this point I should mention that I own her previous book Annabel Langbein's Free Range in the City and can honestly say I have not cooked one thing from it. That's not to say I don't enjoy reading it and planning to make some of the recipes, which is what I do with a lot of my cookbooks because I have so many. This time however, for the purposes of this review I set out to cook a few recipes from Simple Pleasures.

- Slow-roast Lamb with a Herb Crust
- Poached Chicken
- Butter Cookies

 



Some thoughts:

The recipes are very simple, some very basic. Unfortunately the poached chicken I made was dry. That could be down to the quality of the chicken. As we all know there's free-range and then there's free-range. In other words depending on how much you spend on your free-range chook it varies.

The herb encrusted lamb I would not make again. I love lavender and this recipe includes it, but there was something about the flavour in the herb crust that did not sit right with me. It was too perfumey and oddly tasted a bit like I had draped the poor lamb in anchovies. Apart from that there was nothing actually wrong with my lamb. The potatoes that baked under the lamb were a ok, but again reminded me of one of my most hated dishes of all time Swedish Sjomansgryta were the potatoes are sliced and cooked in the meat broth.

The butter biscuits though were not bad. I have a similar recipe that uses condensed milk so I know that using this particular ingredient in biscuits works a treat. A note though, even though I halved the recipe it still made one hell of a lot of bikkies, in my case Hazelnut and chocolate and Lavender. These would be great for bake sales.

I'm still debating whether or not to keep this book. Space is at a premium in my house so I might just take down the cookie recipe and give this book away. Any takers?

Dreams are made of ammonium carbonate

These biscuits are melt in the mouth buttery with a hint of cinammon. Currently a favourite of mine - I find I'm baking them quite a bit.

They're reminiscent of a traditional Swedish biscuit called Drömmar, translated Dreams. The secret ingredient is ammonium carbonate, which is commonly used in Scandinavia. It yields a very light airy product in baked goods and a texture impossible to achieve with bicarbonate soda or baking powder.

If you're able to get your mitts on some ammonium carbonate, or Hjorthornssalt as I know it, be careful to seal it properly as the smell will penetrate everything. But don't worry, the smell of ammonium doesn´t affect the baked goods as it dissipates on cooking.

Swedish lesson 1: SPRÖD

Sometimes words just don’t exist in the English language to describe the perfect consistency of a biscuit/cookie/meringue/pie crust.

The Swedish expression SPRÖD is one of those words. It just epitomizes a good biscuit: crunchy and light. Sometimes if you’re lucky – it also has that desired buttery finish. Yum! Notice how I had to use three different ways in English to describe what in Swedish is only 1 word: SPRÖD (plural SPRÖDA)

How I love thee.

In other words: Perfection. Some baked goods that can be categorized as being SPRÖDA:

• A good quality thin pie crust made with real ingredients
• Several varieties of biscuits with a nice light crunchy bite
• Homemade wafers and other thin and delicate baked goods
• Meringue

...and some might even say Macaroons. Although they are both SPRÖDA and a bit chewy

The other night when I was desperate for some bikkies to have with my cuppa I was rummaging through the cookbook stash for a quick fix when I stumbled across Monika Ahlberg´s recipe for Oatmeal Biscuits (Havrekakor).

She promises ”SPRÖDA Oatmeal Biscuits with a lovely buttery finish”. Hey, who am I to argue with Monika, one of the doyennes of the Swedish foodie community. The recipe was easy to boot too. Just a bit of melt, mix and click action.

SPRÖDA Oatmeal Biscuits

150 g Butter

300 ml Oats (3dl)

75 ml Sugar (3/4 dl)

75 ml Raisins (3/4 dl)

150 ml Plain flour (1 ½ dl)

1 tsp Bicarbonate Soda

1. Turn the oven on: 200 degrees Celsius. Line cookie tray with baking paper. Melt the butter. Pour over the oats. Stir well and let stand for a few minutes.

2. Add sugar, raisins and finally the flour mixed with the bicarbonate soda.

3. Dollop tablespoons of the mixture onto the prepared baking tray and flatten slightly. Bake for 15-20 minutes. I’d recommend checking on the biscuits after 10 minutes as you don’t want them to burn. Then keep checking at 2-4 minute intervals depending on how they are browning. They should be ever so slightly browned but not burnt underneath.

4. Transfer with a spatula to a cookie rack and leave for 10 minutes so they have time to set. Enjoy delicious goodness with a nice cup of tea!

Leftovers part 1 – White Chocolate

With the wedding cake project over letting two bars of white chocolate sit in the fridge was not an option. It had to come to some use. Since I’ve been wanting to try Cranberry and White Chocolate Cookies for a while now that seemed like the perfect solution for my leftovers.

I used Bill Grangers classic recipe but I’ve substituted with cherries instead. Plus, I made them smaller than his because I don’t like massive cookies. I also baked them for longer to get for some crunch. Hate, absolutely hate chewy cookies.