Almond Cookies

Finally! I finally managed to do some cookies Chinese New Year cookies. My idea is to work on either cashew cookies or almond cookies for a start and I settled on the latter. This almond cookie recipe requires no butter but uses oil instead. Hmm.. no butter? I normally wouldn't go for cookies that are butterless. No harm trying out the recipe since the dough seems easy to make with no creaming required. The best part about making it is that the dough requires no chilling at all!

It wasn't such a bad idea working on these cookies. Even though they lacked the buttery fragrance, the cookies tasted decently nutty and crunchy. After a few days of storage, they still keep their crunch really well. Neat! With the absence of butter, these cookies do not prove to be overly rich to the palate. I do find it a good change from the usual rich buttery cookies that are abound during the Chinese New Year period.



I know it is less than a week to Chinese New Year. I am still holding on to the possibility that I might be opening my 'mini pineapple tart factory' before sunday. Its either pineapple tarts or butter cakes, see how it goes... This might possibly be my final post before CNY, so I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Happy Chinese New Year! Huat ar!

Note:  I will be attempting to improve on the recipe. Find that there is a little something lacking in its taste. Texture wise it is pretty good. Will try to either do a butter version or substitute part of the flour with same weight of ground almond to improve the flavour.

Almond Cookies (recipe adapted from Delicious Nyonya Kueh and Desserts by Patricia Lee)
Serving size: about 50 cookies, fills one small CNY plastic cookie tub
Taste and Texture: Crunchy-crumbly, nutty, non-buttery
Equipment and materials:
1) Mixing bowl
2) Flour sieve
3) Baking/cookie trays
4) Wire rack
5) Measuring spoon set
6) Baking paper
7) Wire whisk

Ingredients:
120g diced almonds, toasted
220g plain flour (try substituting some plain flour with same weight of ground almond for richer flavour)
100g icing sugar
105g corn oil
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt + a pinch more
2 egg yolks for eggwash

Making the dough:
Toasting the almonds: Place diced almonds in a single layer on a tray lined with baking paper. Toast the diced almonds at 160 degrees C for 20- 25 minutes until lightly browned. This will improve the fragrance of the almonds.

Prepare dry ingredients: Sift flour, icing sugar, baking soda, baking powder and salt into a large mixing bowl. Mix dry ingredients evenly with a wire whisk. Add in the almonds and mix well.

Forming the dough: Add corn oil to the dry ingredients. Gather the mixture to form a dough. Gently knead the dough to incorporate dough crumbs.

Shaping cookies: Roll cookie dough between 2 pieces of baking paper to about 1cm thick. Cut out cookies with desired cutters. Gather scraps and continue cutting out dough until dough is used up.

Baking the cookies: Brush eggwash onto cut out cookie dough. Bake cookies at 160 degrees C for about 20 minutes. Remove baked cookies and allow them to cool on wire rack completely before storing in air-tight containers.

Notes:
1) Try substituting some of the flour with ground almond for richer flavour. This may make the cookie melt-in-the mouth since there is less gluten due to less flour used.
2) Cookies taste better the next day.

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