This week for the Tuesday office bake I made these oh-so cute Coconut & Cherry cookies. Rather tropical isn’t it? Maybe it will pass on some of it’s “tropical-ness” to the people who eat it. In Amsterdam at the moment it is not warm …. to be exact it is about 8°C during the day even though it’s deceptively sunny; and about 3°C at night. It’s stew and casserole season!
OH!! Speaking of which I have begun cooking with a pressure cooker and it has been a revelation!! You can catch up on that story in my other entry, under the “NEW TOYS” category.
Anyway, so todays cookies did not cost me a dime. Why? Because all the ingredients were already in my pantry in abundant quantities. I got a little over excited last month when I walked into Xenos and saw they were selling these 250 g bags of dessicated coconut for a song …. so I bought 2 packets. Its usually difficult to obtain dessicated coconut in the usual stores I go to coz they sell them in these little 50 – 100 g boxes; and sometimes they are all sold out. That was a month ago though. Now, a month later I still have them and I have hardly used any so the search was on to find a cookie that utilised coconut.
What’s that? Lamingtons, you say??
NO!!
I made lamingtons for the office a while ago and it almost killed me! Not the easiest of cake to make, especially when the “help” said he wanted jam-filled ones and then decided he didn’t feel like helping on that particular day either. :p It was messy … VERY messy. And the chocolate sets very quickly so you need to move fast especially if its a cold day and you don’t have one of those fancy chocolate re-heater thingies.
However, for a first attempt I think it went well, all things considered. The people at the office certainly said they liked them, and they’re all Aussies. The foreign staff, I was told, were curious about this new confection and ventured a taste. The verdict : It wasn’t bad at all. Must be the jam … mmmm … I like jammy vanilla sponge cake. But not this week, my dears. It is yet another cookie. Are you all getting a bit tired of cookies? Well TOUGH! And I hope you like cherries with that!
This recipe has very few ingredients, so if you are in a hurry or cannot be bothered shopping for fancy-fandangled ingredients like demerara sugar, then this is the recipe for you. It has a nice buttery taste, and since there is not much in way of other flavours you want to use a very good quality butter. I always use unsalted, but add a pinch of salt later to the flour. It has a pretty high sugar content so if you feel it is a touch sweet then reduce the sugar accordingly. The sugar does however give it a nice crunch so don’t over-do it.
The recipe calls for the glacé cherries to be chopped and then added to the mix, but today I was in no mood to stand and chop sticky globules of cherries, so I pulsed them in my mini chopper. They turned out finer than expected but they still retained a few lumps here and there.
Tip : Oil the inside of your chopper before adding the cherries to make it easier on youself later when trying to spoon the contents out.
Ingredients:
- 80 g glacé cherries
- 60 g dessicated coconut
- 80 g icing / powdered sugar
- 50 g superfine granulated sugar
- 1 whole egg
- 2 tbsp whole milk
- 180 g flour
- Pinch of salt
- 1 tsp bicarb powder
- 16 extra glace cherries for garnish
- Pre-heat oven to 190°C. Line two cookie sheets.
- Chop or in my case, mince cherries
- Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Scrape down the bowl.
- Then add the egg and milk.
- Meanwhile in a bowl sift the flour, add the coconut, bicarb and salt. Then add the dry ingredients in with the wet all at once. Stir until just combined, do not overmix.
- Using a mini ice cream scoop, place dollops of cookie batter onto the trays about 1 inch apart. I usually go with about 12 cookies per sheet. Bake for 12 – 15 minutes.
- When they come out of the oven, immediately smoosh a cherry on the top of the still soft cookie. Then transfer to wire racks to cool completely. They will harden as they cool.
4 comments
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Natalie
November 15, 2011 at 4:13 pm (UTC 1) Link to this comment
These are SO TASTY!
I’ve always had a massive obsession with coconut goodies and these were just wonderful. Perfect texture (not too solid like ANZAC biscuits) and the cherries are a great touch.
bubviv
November 15, 2011 at 4:39 pm (UTC 1) Link to this comment
Yeah, I like slightly chewy cookies myself. I’m glad you liked them. Am in the process of trying to come up with a Chocolate coated version …. a bit like a Cherry Ripe bar.
Tom
November 15, 2011 at 4:59 pm (UTC 1) Link to this comment
Love them, thanks again!
I’ve officially named them “JUST ONE MORE” 🙂
carol
September 7, 2013 at 8:43 am (UTC 1) Link to this comment
hi
you forgot to list how much butter under the ingredients. could you send me that – i would like to try these.