Blueberry Cookies

We had some slightly elderly blueberries, and I found this in a book called "Baking with tiny tots" by Becky Johnson. It's been adapted slightly...

75g butter or margarine softened
125g soft light brown sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
175g self raising flour
Grated rind of an unwaxed lemon (didn't have one, left it out)
125g blueberries

1. Line 2 baking sheets with baking paper, preheat oven to 180degC/gas 4
2. Beat together butter and sugar until creamy
3. Add egg and vanilla essence and beat again
4. Sift in the flour, add lemon rind and mix.
5. Stir in blueberries, breaking them up a bit in the process
6. Place dessertspoonfuls of the mixture onto the baking sheets (spread the mounds into rounds to get flat cookies, we left ours in mounds because spreading didn't seem like a good idea with a toddler... One giant, but very thin cookie, anyone?). Leave space between them to allow for spreading.
7. Bake for 12-15 mins until pale golden, remove and allow to cool a little before transferring to a cooling rack.

#dietfail

Gingerbread men (Bimmerman)

Adapted from the Good Housekeeping Cookery Book. These gingerbread men are nice and gingery and still a little bit soft. They are good dunked in Daddy's coffee... Makes 12ish.

350g plain flour
1 tsp bicab of soda
2 tsp ground ginger
100g butter
175g light soft brown sugar (or whatever, I think I used a mixture of caster and demerera last time)
4 tablespoons golden syrup
1 egg, beaten

1. Grease some baking trays (2 or 3)
2. Sift/put the flour, bicarb and ginger into the bowl. Stir in the sugar
3. Melt the butter, then add to the mixture (the original recipe says to rub the butter into the flour, then add the sugar, but this works just as well)
4. Beat the egg and golden syrup together and stir in.
5. Mix to form a dough and knead until smooth
6. Divide in two, then roll out on a floured surface to about 5mm thick. Cut out shapes using a cutter (we did dinosaurs)
7. Decorate with currants for eyes etc if you want to
8. Oven (190 degC) for 12-15 mins until golden. Cool slightly then place on a wire rack.

Oat and raisin cookies

This is adapted slightly from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's "River Cottage Everyday". I've found that this is a good one for baking with the littlies, because, while it does involve melting butter in a pan, it doesn't involve any rubbing the butter in to flour and making breadcrumbs, which little S doesn't approve of at all.

125g unsalted butter
2 tablespoons of honey
100g caster sugar
75g light soft brown sugar (no, we don't always have several types of sugar, so go with what you have)
1 medium egg
150g plain flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
50g jumbo oats
150g raisins
(or 100g of raisins and 75g chopped roasted hazelnuts)

Melt the butter with the honey in a small pan. Put the sugars in a mixing bowl, add the melted butter and beat well with a wooden spoon. Beat in the egg. Throw in the flour, cinnamon and baking powder (Hugh says 'sift') and stir in. Then stir in the oats and raisins. You should have a 'pretty sloppy sort of mixture'.

Line a baking sheet with baking parchment and drop dessertspoonfuls of the mixture on to it, leaving about 4cm between each blob. Bake in a preheated oven at 190 degC for 8-10 minitesm until they are turning pale golden brown. Remove and leave on the baking sheets for a couple of minutes to allow them to firm up, then transfer to a wire rack and leave to cool.

Lemon & Raisin Cookies

Ingredients:

150g / 5oz Dark brown sugar
150g / 5oz Margarine (dairy free if required)
Finely grated rind of 1 lemon
150g / 5oz Self raising flour
1tsp Baking powder
75g / 3oz Porridge oats
75g / 3oz raisins (or other dried fruit)

Method:

- Pre heat oven to 180c /Gas 4
- Cream sugar and margarine. Mix in lemon rind.
- Mix in baking powder, oats and flour. Add raisins and mix.
- Grease baking tray, place heaped dessertspoons of mixture onto tray and flatten slightly (space well apart as mixture spreads).
- Bake for 10 to 15 minutes until golden.
- Leave to cool slightly before moving to wire rack.
- Cookies will feel soft to touch when warm, but will crisp up as they cool.


Add lemon juice for extra tang!
Substitute half of raisins for choc chips.
Try orange rind instead of lemon.

Banana & Apple Cookies

Had my first crack at baking my own cookies today. I've wanted to replicate the Little Plum Spelt Biscuits with Apple, but haven't found a recipe close enough (nor a source of Spelt Syrup). So I've adapted an Amercian recipe, which also meant my conversion from 'cups' to ozs was a rough estimate, at best. The cookies are quite soft & sweet, I think you could cut down the sugar without affecting the taste.

Banana & Apple Cookies

Ingredients:
2 pouches of pureed of Apple & Banana (you could (and possibly should!) use fresh, I just wanted to use these pouches up).
6ozs of brown sugar
2ozs of butter
6ozs of spelt wholemeal
4ozs of white flour
8ozs of oats
1 tsp of baking powder
1/2 tsp of bicarbonate of soda
1/2 tsp of cinnamon


Method:
Preheat your oven to 170C and line two baking trays with greaseproof paper.

Mash the banana in a bowl, add the butter & sugar and mix together.

In a large mixing bowl, bring together all the dry ingredients and mix together. Then stir in the banana mixture and combine. Spoon onto the prepared baking trays and bake in the oven for 20 minutes, or until golden brown.

Adapted from: Parenting Our Kids