Tuesday in the kitchen (Part 1)

It's about a week from Chinese New Year and I've only started baking today.  Not that we're expecting many visitors but I do like to create the festive mood in the house.  Some simple decorations and of course the CNY goodies.  Yesterday at Chinatown, I was so tempted to get a few stems of pussy willow.  In the end, I didn't.

I've yet to make the pineapple tarts.  Hadn't planned to do any baking today as I was making charsiew.  As I flipped through my recipes, I saw the Peanut Cookies printout.  I remember there's some salted peanuts in the cupboard enough for one batch so I started getting everything ready.



Though A loves peanut cookies, I only started making them a few months ago after I stumbled upon this recipe.  I've always thought they are quite complicating to make.  But it can't be any more simple.



Someone mentioned buying ready roasted and salted peanuts from Asda which cost close to nothing.  I didn't know about this the first time I made the cookies.  Imagine the amount of time I had spent on roasting and peeling the skin of the peanuts.  It was such a hassle I thought I wasn't going to do it again.  Until I learnt about the cheap peanuts from the supermarket of course.



Basically, you just pour the peanuts into the food processor and let it do all the work, the grinding that is. Look at the shape when I took off the lid. Isn't it adorable?



I did some experimenting today. I adapted the recipe using one which was given to me by a friend. So instead of just using vegetable oil (peanut oil is recommended), I used 50g of melted butter and reduce the amount of oil to about 100ml. Also, I changed the amount of flour from 250g to 300g plain flour + 50g cornflour. The amount of sugar was also reduced from 200g to 150g.



You see the dough? It's now ready to be rolled into balls for baking. Very simple, isn't it?  (Just realised the author of the recipe took a similar photo as the one above in his video.  I don't remember seeing it until I watched it again to check his recommended temperature to write on my blog).  



The balls of peanut dough are glazed and ready for the oven which is now nice and hot from roasting the charsiew.  Oh yes, I used cashew nuts instead of peanuts as the topping.  A request by A.    



By increasing the amount of flour, I wanted to see if I can achieve the 'crumbly-melt-in-the-mouth' consistency. A had commented the cookies made from my previous attempts didn't have it.  He's a fan, not me.  So if he say so, it must be true.  



Piping hot straight from the oven.  Did they crack because my oven was too hot?  But I'd baked them at 175 degrees C instead of 200.   Perhaps it was because I left them in the oven for another minute or so as they weren't golden enough.  Must remember.....at this point, Singapore's national anthem is being played (I'm listening to 933fm) and I started singing it.  Haha!  How strange to be able to remember it still.  All those years of singing it at school.  It's something you'll never forget I guess.



I had digressed.  Yes, I must remember to be more generous with the glazing next time and make the balls smaller.  Are they of the right consistency?  You'll have to ask A then.  But they pass according to my standard.