Aqua faba royal icing on cookies

Keen readers (yes, both of you) might remember I mentioned aqua faba as a replacement for egg whites in vegan macarons. It's the water out of a tin of beans or chickpeas and although it was named by someone with no respect for Latin declension, it works a treat. This week I used it to make royal iced cookies  - the recipe is below:

Ingredients:

aqua faba 120ml - the water (unsalted) from one tin of chickpeas 

icing (confectioners) sugar, 600g

1 teaspoon cream of tartar

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

The ratio of aqua faba to sugar should be 1:5, so if your tin only yields 100ml, use 500g icing sugar

Method:

Whisk the aqua faba until it's white and frothy, then add the cream of tartar. Whisk some more then add the vanilla essence and add the icing sugar gradually. Continue whisking until you have a stiff glossy royal icing. This takes MUCH longer than it does with egg whites so either use a stand mixer or have strong arms.

This can be used now as stiff royal icing to outline cookies (this helps to create a barrier when you flood the cookies); to add a border; or to pipe brief note of encouragement to your Valentine. 

It can also be flooded - simply add some water and when a thin ribbon disappears back into the morass after 8 seconds, it's ready. It can of course be coloured too.

The ribbon test: one MISSISSIPPI two MISSISSIPPI three...

Outline the cookie with flooded icing, outline again and working inwards fill the whole cookie. 

That's the boring bit over and done with - you now have a 5 minute window of opportunity to have fun dropping in colours and shapes before the icing starts to set.

You can drop in polka dots, or if you want to make the dots into hearts, simply drag a cocktail stick through each dot.

For slightly fancier hearts, drop in two dots and pull them together with a cocktail stick to form a heart

Or if you'd like your cookie to look like a little Fairisle sweater, drop in some lines and feather them up and down with a cocktail stick

I've used gingerbread cookies  - the vegan recipe is here along with a vegan icing recipe that does not use aqua faba.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Speculoos wholemeal biscuits (vegan)

Last year I went to Bruges and discovered the joys of wholemeal Speculoos biscuits, which are somehow tastier than the normal ones. I've played around with the recipe to make a vegan version:

Thanks to my sister Lucy for this new biscuit tin after my last one met a tragic end  on a tiled floor

Ingredients:

100g dairy free margarine
80g soft light brown sugar
20g agave nectar or golden syrup
3 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons speculoos spices (to make 100g Speculoos spices, mix 8g ground white pepper, 8g powdered ginger, 16g ground cloves, 16g ground nutmeg, 48g ground cinnamon and 4g ground cardamon - keep the rest in a jar for next time)
2 tablespoons soya milk
200g wholemeal flour
35g oatbran (you'll find it hiding in the cereal section of a supermarket)

Method:

Cream the margarine, sugar and spices together until they are light and fluffy, then add in the milk and agave nectar or golden syrup.

Mix in the flour and oatbran, then wrap the dough in clingfilm and leave in the fridge for a few hours.

Preheat the oven to 170 degrees C and line two baking trays.

Roll out the dough to a thickness of about 4mm and cut out shapes. This isn't an easy dough to work with - use a generous dusting of white flour on your work surface, rolling pin and dough as it will stick and try to fall apart. Just tell it who's boss and crack on.

Place the biscuits on the baking trays and bake for 12 minutes. Leave to cool on the tray, the biscuits will harden as they cool. Sprinkle with icing sugar to decorate.

Cocoa Sesame Biscuits

Most people have one grocery item that they stockpile for reasons they can't explain. My sister recently sent me a photo of nine bottles of mouthwash with the words "must stop". Come a nuclear winter, at least she and her husband will have minty fresh breath.

For me, the must-have grocery items are tins of butter beans and sesame seeds. I don't know what the attraction is, but when I go past the pulses in the supermarket it's irresistible. One day the tins of beans might come in handy ("hey, come over to my place! I've got LOADS of butter beans"). As for the sesame seeds, they make delicious cocoa biscuits  - not too sweet with a nutty flavour that seems a bit odd at first bite but quickly becomes as seductive as a tin of butter beans on a supermarket shelf (i.e. very).

The recipe is from this great book my mum gave me years ago. It's Australian but it gives the ingredients in cups, grams and ounces, so it is suitable for bakers of all persuasions. It's published by Murdoch Books but I don't think it's connected to THAT Murdoch. Certainly there are no tits on page 3, only a photo of an orange drizzle cake.

You need two tablespoons of golden syrup for the recipe. Ever noticed the drawing on a tin of Tate & Lyle's? It's a dead lion with bees coming out of its rotting corpse, saying "Out of the strong came forth sweetness", a reference to the Biblical Samson who went round killing people and lions and speaking in riddles like a nutter. 

Thanks to Answer Me This Podcast  for bringing this to my attention. If you'd like to give your ears a weekly treat, why not download their podcast and giggle on the bus so much that people start moving seats?

Anyway, here's the recipe for Cocoa Sesame Biscuits:

• 90g plain flour
• 25g cocoa powder
• 75g rolled oats
• 150g sesame seeds
• 190g caster sugar
• 100g unsalted butter (or dairy free margarine if you want to make them vegan)
• 2 tablespoons golden syrup
• 1 tablespoon boiling water
• 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 185g melted chocolate

• Pre-heat the oven to 160oC and line two baking trays with parchment. 
• Mix the flour, cocoa, oats, sesame seeds and sugar; in a pan melt the butter and golden syrup
• Pour the boiling water into a cup, add the bicarbonate of soda, mix well and add this to the melted butter. Enjoy watching it whoosh up into a foam
• Using a metal spoon, fold the mixture into the dry ingredients.
• Roll the mix into balls and flatten them slightly

• Bake for about 12 minutes. They will still be wet and wobbly when you take them out, but they'll harden as they cool. Let them cool for 5 minutes on the trays, then transfer to a wire rack.
• Once the biscuits are cool, add a blob of melted chocolate to each biscuit.
• Put the biscuits into a sad and empty tin that until very recently held some Christmas treats and take them into the office.
• Remember that they fired you months ago, eat all the biscuits yourself and laugh in their stupid faces, saying "out of the strong came forth sweetness".
• Do NOT kill any people or lions.