Shortbread Cookies : I can smell orange in it

Orange Shortbread Cookies, rich in butter and tastes best with a cup of tea or coffee. We were going for new year get-together at my husband's friends house. And what would be best than a box of shortbread cookies for the occasion. Perfect !!!
I baked these cookies and added orange zest which gave them that perfect tangy citrusy flavor.
These are very easy to bake and can be made into any desired shape.
So here is the recipe:

Ingredients :
Butter - 1/2 cup (room temperature)

Castor Sugar - 5 Tablespoon

Finely grated zest of 2 orange( can use 1 )

Flour- 1 1/2 cups

Milk- 2 tablespoons
Extra castor sugar for sprinkling

Method:

• Preheat the oven to 375 F. Grease 2 baking sheets.
• Beat the butter & sugar till creamy & soft.
• Beat in the orange zest. Add the milk.
  
• Gradually add the flour and gently pull the dough in together to form a soft ball.
• Roll out on a lightly floured surface to about 1/2 " to 1/4 " thickness.
  
• Put on the baking sheet,sprinkle with castor sugar, & bake for about 15 minutes till golden brown.
• Remove to a cookie rack to cool. Drizzle with melted chocolate if you like.

Wish you a very Happy and Prosperous year 2009.

Eggless Coconut Butter Cookies

It seems that Minneapolis is not going to see "real summer" this year. Its June already, but even yesterday the sky was all cloudy and it was drizzling outside. Aise mousam mein, thought of having freshly baked cookies with a cup of coffee. Then started searching what is available in my pantry and saw a packet of coconut resting there. Immediately decided to make this eggless coconut cookies which I once found on Food network site. I adopted the recipe from 'here' with few changes to suit my palette. So here comes the recipe: Ingredients :

• All Purpose flour 2 cups
• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, room temperature
  
• 1/2 cup sugar
  
• 1 teaspoon Baking soda
  
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  
• 2 cup sweetened coconut, toasted
  
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Method :

1. In a mixer with a paddle attachment, whip the butter until very light and fluffy.
2. Add the sugar and continue whipping.
3. Then add vanilla extract and mix.
   
4. Toss together the coconut(toasted in oven for 15 mins at 350 F), flour ,Baking soda and salt then add to the butter mixture and mix until blended.
   
5. Cover with a plastic wrap and freeze the dough for 15-20 mins.
6. Take a little dough at a time, roughly shape the dough into a cookie( the dough is not at all sticky so very easy to handle ). Instead, you could even drop dough by spoonfuls onto cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.
7. Preheat oven to 250 F
8. Bake for 15 mins. Then turn the cookie sheet and bake for another 15 mins. After 30 mins when the color was not changed I increased the Temperature to 375 F and baked for another 20 mins until crisp but barely colored.
9. Cool on wire rack till completely cool.

So crispy cookies are ready to enjoy with coffee !! Jab tak Summer nahien aata hei tab tak coffee ke saath in cookies ko hi enjoy karenge! ;)
And now Iam sending this crispy cookies to Suganya for her event ' AFAM- Coconut' ...

Basket Full of Eggless Apple Raisin Muffins

I have been searching for Eggless muffin recipe for a while now and finally found one. I have seen this recipe on the show on food network. These muffins are not only easy to make, but they are very tasty and moist. I made this for our evening snack and although we are not very fond of apples, we can not stop eating them. This recipe is definitely a keeper.
So here is the recipe :

Ingredients:

• Water 1/2 cup
  
• Sugar 1 cup
• Grated apples 1 cup
  
• Raisins 1/4 cup ( can be increased if wanted )
  
• Butter 1/2 cup (1 stick )
• Baking soda 1 teaspoon
• Vanilla Essence 1/2 teaspoon
  
• All Purpose flour 1 3/4 cups
  

Method :

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F .
2. Combine the water, apples, raisins, sugar and butter in a saucepan. Bring to boil.
3. Remove the pan from heat and cool completely.
   
4. In a large bowl, stir the baking soda and vanilla essence into the flour.
5. Add the cooled mixture to the bowl and stir until blended.
6. Fill the greased muffin pan with the batter to the top.
7. Bake for 20 minutes.

Delicious moist muffins are ready to eat.


Note : Walnuts can be added to this for more flavor. These muffins can be stored in re-sealable freezer bag.