Chocolate Shortbread olé

A chocolate type cookie , easy to make, cinnamon and a bit of chili powder. I choose to use smoked chili powder and it is way in the background in the taste of the cookies.

From a Nestle recipe book, instead of pecans , walnuts were used.

• 8oz chocolate bits, ghirardelli chocolate chips used
• 2 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/8 inch cayenne pepper (smoked dried chili flakes used)
• 1 cup light brown sugar
• 1 and 1/2 sticks butter
• 1 cup chopped toasted pecans, (walnuts used)

Melt the chocolate

Mix the sugar and butter till fluffy, add the melted chocolate.

Combine the flour, cinnamon and chili pepper, and stir into the above.

Stir in the nuts.

Shape into 1 inch balls (or use a scooper)  and then press them to flatten with a glass bottom coated in sugar.

Bake 10 to 12 minutes.

My cookies were a bit dry but none the less, very good.

prep, toast the walnuts, melt the chocolate

cookie dough

press with a sugar coated cup

ready to bake

cooling

An interesting salad

This recipe was a re definition of a salad.

Close  to the original recipe,  very filling for a salad that I had about 1/2 of the total amount.

Nuts are said to be a superfood, but I won’t profess about what you (should) eat,  the decision is up to you.

Quinoa salad  from Mrs. Twinkle a WordPress blog .

Now I’m open to a lot of grains, bread, couscous, barley, so this looked like an interesting combination. Now those of you either that have a nut allergy or turned off by a meal with no meat, yes this recipe could be modified from the original but I think that would lose something in the translation.

Being used to the usual greens and tomato type salad, with an oil and vinegar type dressing,  this is a pleasant diversion. Little if any modification to the recipe. Other than sesame oil double and skip the olive oil in the dressing, and some chopped ginger added to the main mix, ( I would taste and bring up the level of ginger in the dressing). The crunch of the red cabbage and the nuttiness of the dressing, on a bed of grains is satifiying. 

 I use double black soy sauce for the dressing. Melt the peanut butter and honey in a microwave safe bowl for about 30 seconds. Stir and finish the dressing and adjust to taste.

Assembled

I resisted to add any heat to this recipe!

apple egg pudding

Having some apples to use, this recipe coincided from a blogger with  the question of what to do with them.

http://nimmiafzal.com/2014/08/06/super-easy-apple-egg-pudding/

This is similar to another recipe German Apple Pancake, that I have made often. https://pmetro.wordpress.com/2013/10/13/german-apple-pancake-apfelpfannkuchen/

This recipe has a bit more body to it. I used more apples that 1/4 and also added some grated ginger for spiciness. The cardamon  is a pleasant flavor for usually expecting a cinnamon apple pie flavor.

Easy ingredients:

6 eggs

apples , sliced

butter or gee

cardamon

Nuts, and/or raisins (I used a variety of nuts on hand)

sugar

First toast the nuts

Then saute the apples in butter

 

Extract some cardamon with some grated ginger root.

6 eggs

 

Arrange the apples and some of the toasted nuts in a buttered baking pan… I sprinkled the sugar on top of the apples here.

 

After beating together the eggs with spices and some nuts, add atop the apples.

Ready for a 400 degree oven..

 

Bake,  turn out, slice and enjoy with coffee or tea.