It seems that Autumn finally has come to Barcelona. I say that because a week ago we could still wear shorts on the street. It's not like we have had a very drastic change of weather but still, you can feel it.
Autumn implies, inevitably, Halloween. Even though it's not a tradition here- our custom is to eat roasted chestnuts and Panellets- there is more and more people who dress up during this magical night.
Hence the poor cookies are terrified!
Stop scaring them!
Cinnamon
and Brown sugar Cookies
Ingredients
(3 dozens aprox.)
- 225g butter (room temperature)
- 135g brown sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 330g flour
- ½ tsp baking powder
Directions
- Beat sugar and butter with an electric mixer until smooth and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla and mix until well combined.
- Mix dry ingredients in a bowl and add them to the other mix gradually. Attention! It is important to mix the ingredients previously, otherwise, the baking powder could form lumps and this would lead to the cookies being baked differently.
- Pre-heat the oven at 180ºC (350ºF).
- Roll out the dough between two baking papers with a rolling pin until achieving half a centimeter of thickness (¼ of an inch). Cut out the cookies with your chosen cookie cutter and remove the extra dough so you can roll it out again. Put the cookies in the freezer for two minutes and transfer them into the tray when they are firm. Make sure the cookies have 1 cm between them so they don't bake together. Repeat this procedure until you have used all the cookie dough.
- Bake the cookies for 10-15 minutes, until they are golden. Let the cookies sit out of the oven for 10 minutes before transferring them into a grid.
- Let the cookies cool completely before decorating them.
Royal
Icing
Ingredients
- 200g confectioners sugar
- 2,5 Tbs water
- 1 Tbs meringue powder
- Food coloring
Directions
- Sift the sugar with a cloth covering the bowl to avoid cover everything in sugar. Add water (gradually) and meringue powder and blend with a spoon.
TIPS
- Yes, I know it sounds tiring to sift the sugar but when the tip of the bottle or the pastry bag clogs for the fifth time because there is a tiny lump, you will wish you had sifted the sugar.
- Add the water gradually. When you are mixing the ingredients you will think that there is not water enough but, believe me, it will be enough. If you put too much water, you can always add more sugar to thicken the icing but it's better to be careful with the water you add to avoid ending up with a lot of icing. So add the water gradually.
- The icing has to be thick to trace the borders and, afterwards, the detailed decorations. However, for the interior of the cookie, the icing has to needs to be more fluid, therefore you will have to add more water to the mix (gradually!).
- Have some smaller bowls prepared in order to add the food coloring.
- When you use the food coloring, bear in mind that is very concentrated. Just a little will do! I use the tip of a toothpick to add the coloring to the icing. If you want a darker shade, you can always add more.
- Cover the bowl that has the icing in it with plastic wrap while you are not using it. By doing this you will prevent the top layer of icing getting hard.
The recipes can be downloaded here: Cinnamon and Brown Sugar Cookies and Royal Icing.
Anna
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