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Cookie
Recipes & Coffee
There is no rainy day that I
wouldn't end up baking cookie recipes with my daughter. Since we have moved
to England this has become our little ritual. There are so many easy recipes
for kids so the choices are endless. It is such a big pleasure to see my
little girl having great fu
is always so sweet and yummy.
I know many parents who don't know how to spend quality time together with
their children. I would say, find a good book full of cookie recipes and
start baking cookies. It doesn't matter if you bake chocolate cookies,
Christmas cookies, sugar cookies and so on, children will be happy with any
of those cookie recipes. From my own experience I know that they love to
help in the kitchen and have actually great baking skills. Mixing, weighing,
cutting, cracking eggs, kneading,... an absolute heaven for every child.
Sometimes my daughter argues with me, because she wants to do everything
herself (sorry my sweetheart, you should grow a bit more).
I often experiment when we bake cookies together. It is because I love to
pair coffee and food and compare different tastes to find out if the taste
of cookies matches well with the taste of coffee. But for doing this I need
a help of all my family and friends (my dear guinea pigs :) ...sorry guys!)
who "voluntarily" eat my cookies and have them together with a nice cup of
coffee. It is quite exciting to wait for their final verdict. By now I
haven't received any complaints yet and nobody has quit this "hard" job yet
:). Hmm, I wonder why?
Here are the cookie recipes
which have been baked in our kitchen recently and are in perfect combination
with a cup of coffee:
Cinnamon and chocolate cookies tuiles
Chocolate butter cookies
Chocolate chip cookie recipe
Almond & cinnamon macaroons
 
What are actually cookies?
Cookies (or biscuits in the UK)
are small, crisp, flat and yummy baked sweet or savoury cakes that are good
to nibble. Sweet cookies could be accompanied by coffee and savoury by a
soup.
There is a big difference between homemade and commercially made cookies.
Homemade cookies taste better, they are not so sweet, don't contain
additives and you have a choice of using only the best ingredients. Can we
say that for commercially made cookies? I don't think so.
What do I need to start
baking cookies?
In most cases cookie recipes
contain flour, butter, sugar, eggs, baking powder and different flavors.
Nothing that couldn't be found in almost every kitchen in the world.
Cookies can be made using a wide
variety of methods. They can be:
Cookies are usually baked in
10-15 minutes and are best eaten straight from the oven. If they are not
stored properly they become soft and tasteless in a day or two.
That's not really a problem in our house because there is not only my
daughter who craves for something sweet and yummy, my husband is even worse.
Before you start baking
cookies please remember:
Cookies don't need to be fancy
or complicated, they are just perfectly good in their "yummy" simplicity.
Cookie baking tips
-
Preheat
oven 10-15 minutes before you start baking cookies. Bake them 2-3
minutes less than originally prescribed time and check. If cookies are
not baked continue with baking for another 2-3 minutes. Get an oven
thermometer.
-
Before
baking place cookies on cool baking sheet or they may start to melt and
spread out.
-
Make sure
to leave some room between cookies on the baking sheet (depends on the
recipe but an inch or two is usually enough).
-
Chill the
dough before cutting out and baking cookies. It is much easier to work
with chilled dough.
-
Bake only
one baking sheet at a time in the center of the oven.
-
Cool
cookies on a wire rack to prevent them becoming soggy, unless the recipe
states otherwise.
-
Use top
quality and fresh ingredients.
-
Do follow
the recipe if it calls for ingredients at a room temperature.
-
Make sure
your butter is at room temperature otherwise it won't cream properly
with the sugar.
-
Don't
substitute flour types, use the type of flour suggested in a recipe and
don't over mix the dough.
-
Measure
all quantities correctly.
-
Do not
grease baking sheets unless the recipe says so as this may affect the
taste and baking itself.
-
Store
soft cookies in an airtight container. This could be a jar or a tin with
a tight fitting lid. Cookies should be always cooled before storing.
When stored, crisp cookies slowly become soft, and soft ones can harden
and dry out.
Good to know
-
The name
cookie is derived from the Dutch word koekje (little cake). Mini cakes
were made by accident when cooks used a small amount of cake batter to
test the oven temperature.
-
Almost
every culture has some kind of cookie-like treats.
-
Cookies
are usually eaten for a snack or as a dessert.
-
There are
so many easy recipes for kids where cookies can be dropped, moulded,
pressed, refrigerated, make like a bar or rolled.
-
If you
would like to start cooking with kids you can find easy recipes for kids
in almost every cook book from your local library or in your favorite
magazine.
-
There are
so many good web sites with really good cookie recipes, so just take
some time and start exploring.
-
Easy
recipes for kids usually require only basic baking ingredients, so there
are no big costs.
-
If you
don't feel sufficiently confident to start cooking with kids by your own
find a cooking course in your area.
-
Most of
cookie recipes don't require any special baking skills, just a lot of
good will.
-
Do not
hesitate, cooking with kids is such a great fun and such a rewarding
activity. Cooking with kids has also an educational value.
-
Usually
children eat too much junk food so cooking with kids teaches them how to
make things themselves.
-
If they
learn a few basic easy recipes for kids their eating habits could
improve and change dramatically.
-
But most
importantly cooking with kids must be the time full of fun and joy, not
only for a child but also for a parent. Enjoy!
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