Halfway Cookies, or Chocolate Meringue Slice

I believe I’ve gone a little bit insane. So far today I’ve baked six things and the content of this blog makes number seven. And I could keep going! Except I’m going to run out of butter soon, and I so can’t be bothered paying service station prices for some more. Plus I’m kinda out of ideas. Why am I baking so insanely? Well, a prize in a recent raffle was some of my baking. I didn’t actually expect anybody to want the prize, but apparently somebody does and so here I am baking like mad. And I also organised to swap baking for a hat – and said hat is adorable, cute, and now in my possession. So baking for her too! My kitchen looks like the cupboard and fridge threw up on it. That’s a delightful image for a baking blog, isn’t it? Vomit, it makes the world go ‘round.

I’m making ‘halfway cookies’ now, which I think is an entirely useless and stupid name. It is actually a biscuit based chocolate meringue slice. I don’t quite understand the American obsession with naming everything that isn’t a cake a cookie. Do they not believe in slices? Are they slice-ist? This is serious business, people. Anyway, this is a slice.

Ingredients

2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 cup brown sugar, separated
2 eggs, separated
1 tablespoon water
1 teaspoon vanilla
12 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips or chunks

Method

1. Cream the butter and two types of sugar until light and very fluff (only 1/2 cup of the brown sugar).



2. Remember you have banana bread in the oven, and swear as you grab it out.

3. Try not to be too spastic, and attempt to separate two eggs. Add the yolks into the butter mixture one at a time. At least, pretend you’re following the recipe, but completely disregard it and throw the yolks in at the same time.



4. Biff in all the dry ingredients nd the water in and mix until it forms a nice, cohesive dough.





5. Then you press it into a pan, and cover with chocolate chips!



6. Remember the separated eggs? And how you have whites left over? Well now you get to beat them! When they’re getting all frothy and starting to stiffen, slowly add in the second lot of brown sugar, and then continue letting them beat until they form glossy, stiff peaks.





7. Skilfully spread over the stuff in the pan. If you manage to do it skilfully, you’ll be doing better than me.



8. After it’s been in the oven for about five minutes, cover the meringue with a piece of cooking paper so it doesn’t colour any more. As we’ve used brown sugar in this meringue, it’s going to be a bit chewier, and a bit nuttier in flavour. I’m totally looking forward to it! Let cook for another 15 minutes.



9. Rather than take it out of the oven immediately after it’s finished cooking, leave it in the oven once you’ve turned it off for ten minutes. It’ll keep cooking a bit, which is why I’ve cut the original cooking time down, but it’ll also help make sure that the meringue doesn’t flop.



10. Slice into squares and consume. This is extra yummy while still warm.

Salted Caramel Chocolate Bars

It's been a while. I feel a bit out of the swing of things, though that may have to do with the fact that I'm baking at 3 am, rather than baking at all. But still, getting into the blogging thing is hard! All this typing, and thinking.

Anyway, I’m making something called salted caramel chocolate bars, which as you can tell, involves caramel and salt. And chocolate. Sounds pretty damn awesome right? It better, because I have very high expectations at the moment; I want something easy but awesome to bake. I’m easing myself back into the strenuous world of midnight baking. And that jar of Hershey’s caramel was expensive, though come to think of it – it wouldn’t really take that much more effort to make my own and replace it in the recipe. I might do that if I make this a second time. Somebody remind me I said that.

On with the show.

Salted Caramel Chocolate Bars

Ingredients

1 ½ c flour
1 ½ c rolled oats
1 ¼ c brown sugar
200g butter, melted
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking soda
Enough chocolate chips to evenly cover the base
5 tbsp flour
16 ounces caramel sauce (I used Hershey's)
¼ tsp flakey sea salt, ground up roughly (no chunks, but not as fine as table salt) 

Method

1. Locate your mixing bowls. If you live in my house, they like to go wandering. To obscure places in the kitchen. I suspect my sister again, she’s back from Australia for a holiday.

2. Gather all your measuring cups (and drop them), and measure out the flour, oats, brown sugar, cinnamon and baking soda. Biff them all into the bowl and mix together.



3. The original recipe says you now need a cup of butter – what a stupid measurement, right? (I’ll measure it for you, so you don’t have to battle!)The best way to actually do this is have soft butter and smush it into the cup, then melt and pour into the mix. Not all at once though. So let’s see how this goes!

4. Unexpectedly, it works out perfectly. The dough is still very crumbly, but it’s moist and the butter covers everything.



Insert rant: Yummm. This mixture is awesome. Very Anzac biscuit-y, but with a deeper, slightly nutty flavour (from the cinnamon and brown sugar). I think I might have to play around with this; half the baking soda, add some baking powder and make some awesome biscuits.

5. Restrain yourself from eating it all, and press half the mixture into a square baking tin. Then throw it in the oven for ten minutes at 180 degrees Celsius.



6. Open the jar of caramel sauce. Yell at it if you need. Swear words are acceptable, because what the hell? Those things are so hard to get into! Anyway, after you’ve done that, pour it into a smaller bowl.



7. Add the 5 tablespoons of flour, and mix away!





8. Once your base is out of the oven, let it cool for ten minutes, then spread the chocolate over top of it and then sprinkle the course salt over top (you can add more chocolate if you like). Salt seems weird right? But it’s unbelievably awesome with things like caramel and chocolate, as it brings out the flavours and provides and awesomely vivid contrast. Omnomnom.



9. Finally, sprinkle on the rest of the cake mixture stuff. Do not press it down – you can pat gently, but even that is going to make it squidg around. I could have done with a slightly bigger pan, but anything else I had was too big... so that’s what I was stuck with. Plus, it has a false bottom, so makes for easy removal later!



10. Then into the oven for twenty minutes. My tip would be to put a tray or some baking paper under the baking pan so that if any caramel does escape, it won’t get onto the bottom of your oven and become horribly stubborn and refuse to leave.

11. Leave it to cool completely before you cut into it, otherwise the caramel will just ooze everywhere.

While this tastes like a giant chocolately, gooey anzac biscuit ... thing, and is very tasty, next time I would halve the caramel. It's just all over the place! But then again, lots of caramel is yummy... so it's your own choice, I guess.

ANZAC Biscuits

This post is a little more serious than usual, because I intend to make ANZAC biscuits. And with those comes the inevitable subject matter of the First World War (WWI). I’m not going to give you a history lesson, mostly because I can’t be bothered and also because most of you that read this already know the details. But for Australians and New Zealanders, this time of the year is weird. For New Zealand, definitely, in this day and age it’s so difficult to reconcile so many deaths with an argument that wasn’t our own, and I can’t help but think of what it may seem like to those multicultural members of New Zealand’s society. Because really, we’re not simply former English colonists now. And yet, whilst I don’t quite understand the motivation, I can’t help but respect and admire those men who did go off to war, and especially those who did not make it back. It makes me think though, about the kind of recognition they get here. Celebrations in New Zealand are so low key – there are quiet, simple dawn parades, and each family remembers their own hero in their own way. The contrast is so striking when compared to things like the American Memorial Day. I like what we do, but you’ve got to wonder if maybe we should do something bigger? I have noticed in the last few years, the trend seems to be heading that way.

That was a bit heavier than I intended. All for an introduction to a very simple biscuit! I’ve made ANZAC biscuits tonnes of times, and really, you can’t beat ‘em. I’m not a fan of oats (much too healthy for my liking), or coconut, but something about these biscuits makes me love them. Incidentally, this is my ANZAC celebration. I don’t really have any family members that I know of who fought in the war, but I’m sure there were some. So this is my way of saying, I-know-you-existed once-upon-a-time-and-hey?-thanks. Also, dipping the bottoms of these in melted chocolate is awesome, so if you want to do that, I’m sure your ancestors would approve. Because people loved chocolate way back then, too. These biscuits are also great with icecream and a bit of caramel sauce. What? Just giving you ideas here, people.

ANZAC Biscuits

Ingredients

1 Cup plain flour
1 Cup sugar
1 Cup rolled oats
1 Cup fine coconut
125g butter or margarine
2 Tbsp golden syrup
2 Tbsp boiling water
1 tsp baking soda

Method

1. Drag yourself into the kitchen. Realise you have no butter. Bitch loudly and leave the house to get some.

2. Return with the butter, still bitching.

3. Measure out your dry ingredients (minus the baking soda) and chuck them into the pretty blue mixing bowl you happened to buy when you were getting the butter.



4. In a separate bowl, mix together the melted butter, hot water and golden syrup (I find it’s easier to dissolve the golden syrup in the hot water first), and then finally add the baking soda. Watch it do awesome stuff.





5. Mix the two sets of ingredients together and then eat all the mixture before you cook it. Or not, but you could, because ANZAC mixture is sooo good. Mmm. Also chase your father out of the kitchen with a knife.



6. If you decide not to eat all the mixture, roll it into balls and then squish them out onto your baking tray, but leave a lot of space between the biscuits as they will spread. Thanks to a lovely friend, I have been reminded that I actually forgot to put a cooking temperature and time. Sorry. So.. 180 degrees celcius until very golden.



7. Eat. Chase your father away again. You may use two knives this time.



I don’t want to be cheesy, but I kinda want to say thanks to anybody who fought in a war and stood up for what they believed in. Pretend these biscuits are for you. I am now over being patriotic – see, it doesn’t last for long. I’m also not very good at it.

No Bake Lemon Cheesecake

I can’t decide if I like cheesecake or not – I think my opinion is best summed up fussily by saying I like cheesecakes that aren’t baked, and can take or leave those that are. And really not at all a fan of Japanese cheesecakes (and yes, I’ve had the authentic ones, from Japan). If I eat a cheesecake, I really like to be able to taste the tart sharpness of the cream cheese, and prefer citrus ones to sweet. Probably because the cream cheese is so cloying, I need that sharpness to cut it. I’m so fussy, maybe this is why I generally stick to chocolate – you can’t screw chocolate up.

So anyway, from that, you can probably guess I’m making cheesecake, and most likely of the non-baked, citrus variety. Ten points! Wait, that’s for running over old ladies. Or is that just a New Zealand thing? I think it is. Just to reassure you, it’s just a joke, we don’t really go around violently driving over elderly people. Carrying on!

No Bake Lemon Cheesecake

Ingredients

Base
1 c biscuit crumbs (I used malt biscuits)
50 g butter

Innards
1 tbsp gelatine powder
3 tbsp water
250g cream cheese
60g castor sugar
2 large egg yolks
Zest from 2 lemons.
3 – 5 tbsp lemon juice
150ml cream, whipped

Method

1. Find one of your many spring form pans, that your sister in one of her last cleaning binges, relocated to some obscure realm of the kitchen and then neglected to tell you (probably in hopes of you never using it again, and therefore not making another mess ). Then line the bottom with cooking paper.

2. Mix the biscuit crumbs and butter in a bowl, then press firmly into the tin. Into the fridge to set, whilst you make the innards. I mean, ... what do you call it? We’ll stick with innards until my brain starts working. After all, it is only midday as I write this (maybe not as I post it).



3. Mix the gelatine and water together, making sure you combine them properly. Just set aside and forget about it.



4. Cream the cream cheese (hehe – I’m sad) and sugar together.



5. Zest the lemons and separate eggs. Grumble because somebody took apart your awesome zest catchy tool, and you can’t get it back together. Give up and use the normal grater. Then add the zest and separated yolks to the cream cheese mix. It’s already looking more cheesecakeish! Eee.



6. Now do something weird. Remember the gelatine? It’ll look weird now. Anyway. Get a small sauce pan and set up a double boiler, setting the bowl of gelatine stuff on top. Apparently it needs to dissolve again.

7. While that’s happening, squeeze some lemon until you have 3 – 5 tbsp of lemon juice. I like lots of lemon flavour, so... we can guess which way I’m going.

8. When the gelatine is dissolved again, take it off the heat and mix it into the ... innards. It will look quite runny here – but this is why we’ve added gelatine. Then follow with the lemon juice. Set aside for five minutes.



9. Use your five minutes wisely and whip some cream to soft peaks – no over whipping, students!



10. Very gently fold the cream into the rest of the mixture, and marvel at how cool it looks. Resist tasting it, and fail. Make stupid noises.



11. Pour onto the refrigerated base, then shake gently to even it out and cover with glad wrap. Shove it back in the fridge, for at least four hours!



Many hours later, during which I went to work, thought about the cheesecake, did some shoping, thought about the cheesecake, tidied stuff up, and thought about the cheesecake some more.

This cheese cake is delicious. Really tart though - so if you're not a huge fan of citrus, make sure that you don't put a lot of lemon juice in it. My family especially enjoyed it because whilst it may have a high fat content, the sugar in this cheesecake is relatively low. Which makes it pretty good for diabetics (which my mother just happens to be), so it was cool that she could actually enjoy some of my baking for once. Especially awesome with even more fat. I mean whipped cream.

Strawberry Milkshake White Chocolate Chip Cookies

I’m not a big fan of strawberry; I am obviously much more of a chocolate fan (and I also love semicolons). But when I saw this recipe I just had to try it, and then pass the link onto as many people as possible. I think it may have had something to do with the pastel pink colour; so kitsch and cute. Adore! What? I could totally live in a fifties kitchen. They had dishwashers back then. Sort of. It also helped that nesquik is on special at the supermarket this week; because it’s not really something that I keep in my cupboard. I generally prefer stronger, real flavours. However, if a recipe really takes my fancy, I will (on occasion), use some sort of highly processed something that is no doubt going to preserve my organs and shorten my life.

Strawberry Milkshake White Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients

250g butter
½ c Nesquik strawberry flavour (I didn't think this was enough - you may want to increase it)
¾ brown sugar
2 eggs
2 – 4 drop red food colouring (I used two – but next time I’d use four)
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 ½ c flour
1 tsp baking soda
8 ounces white chocolate drops.

Method

1. In a big bowl, put your room temperature butter, then the nesquik and brown sugar. Then beat them! With a stick! Actually, beaters of the electric variety would probably work better. For a few minutes, at least, until the mixture is nice and fluffy.





2. Add the eggs and a few drops of red food colours – BE CAREFUL. Food colouring has a mind of its own and is determined to all fly out of the bottle at once. You do not want radioactive red cookies. Kthnxbye.



3. Flour next. Oh, and the vanilla and baking soda, I guess they’re important too. Beat them too. Like they came home drunk and had slept with your best friend, that whore. What? I like stories.



4. Finally, add in the chocolate. The original recipe called for ten ounces, but I am not a fan of more chocolate than cookie, so I took it down to eight ounces, which also happened to be the entire contents of the bag I had bought. Obviously it was meant to be. You can add more, if you like.



On a side note, I left the beater attachments unattended, with the intention of using them to mix in my chocolate pieces. HOWEVER, before I could, my father came along and licked all the mixture off. Then he refused to clean them up, so not only did he inconvenience me, he made more work for me! So unimpressed.

5. Spoon them out to whatever size you like and into the oven at 180 degrees celcius. I rolled mine, just because that is what I’m used to, and I like my biscuits to be tidy. Perfectionist? Of course not. I also prefer mine smaller.



Apparently mine look nothing like the original! Ha, but they are pretty, and less pink (so you might want to add one or two extra drops of red food colours back up on step two). Yummy too. My mother and father both demanded a couple straight out of the oven – and the dog even got in on the action! However, I do find that the strawberry is a bit of an afterthought. It’s there, but only just. If I was to make this recipe again, and I probably won’t because the finished product didn’t make a big enough impact on me, I would go so far as to double the strawberry factor. In future, I’ll stick to just drinking strawberry milk. The cookie texture is great though – nice and light, and with just the right amount of chocolate (if I do say so myself!). The white chocolate definitely suits the delicate flavour profile of the cookie. What the hell? I think it’s time to stop watching the food network.