Tahini Chocolate Chip Cookies

These were based on The Kitchen Magpie's Thick & Chewy Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies. I don't tend to have peanut butter around, but I did have a large jar of tahini (sesame seed paste). I also used coconut oil instead of butter, a little less sugar, and fewer chocolate chips. (Using fewer chips sounds bad, but believe me, there was still plenty of chocolatey goodness. 😃) These were such awesome cookies! I feel certain I'll make them again sometime.

After making enough cookies to fit a baking sheet, I patted the rest into an oven-proof cereal bowl, and baked it in that. It took about the same time to bake as the individual cookies. Just cut up the result however you like. These cookies, in whichever shape, lasted a long time, as long as their container was tightly covered.

The Kitchen Magpie Website, Thick & Chewy Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Tahini (Sesame Seed Paste) 

Cookies

These cookies conain tahini (sesame seed paste), sugar, egg, vanilla, salt, rice flour, and baking powder. The recipe is from Lil' Cookie, and calls for cornstarch or a gluten-free flour. I decided to use rice flour, but it would be interesting to make it another time with cornstarch, to see if there's any difference.

I read the recipe thoroughly, but didn't look enough at the photo. I guess that's why these cookies look bigger and thicker than the original. The main problem this caused, was they took longer to bake. I wanted to make sure they didn't get overdone, as I tend to like cookies which are softer. However, luckily for me they came out great!

These reminded me of peanut butter cookies. They actually tasted best when one was eaten just by itself (not after something else), slowly. Yummy!

Lil' Cookie Website, Gluten Free Tahini Cookies

Throwback to: Milk Cookies (from December 2016), based on the Eggnog Cookies of The Domestic Geek. In honor of National Cookie Day!

Ka'k (Lebanese Cake Doughnuts)

These are from Lebanese Cuisine, by Madelain Farah. I tend to eat these as a late-evening snack, and by then I don't feel so much like taking pics. Fortunately, I managed to get a couple with my phone: one right before a snack, and the second, shortly after baking. Someone who saw them said, "Oh, cookies!" I just agreed that they were cookies, because I'm not sure how to classify them. They don't really taste like doughnuts, but they seem more than cookies. Anyway, they are fabulous for a sweet snack to end the day! 

The original recipe makes 7-8 dozen! I divided the recipe by 1/3, which made a little over 2 dozen. That was enough for me, for now. In place of clarified butter, I used coconut oil.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Throwback Thursday, back to: January 2015. Chocolate Chip Cookies (with oil, not butter), the entire batch of dough baked in a deep glass pie plate. Afterwards, I cut it into small squares. It was easier, at the time, than baking dozens of single cookies. 

My earliest posts to this blog, last autumn, included photos taken on my current tablet. These were followed by photos taken on both my camera and my phone. Most of my previous tbt (Throwback Thursday) posts have included tablet photos not included originally in my feed, or featured again because I thought you might like to see them. Recently, I remembered photos from my old tablet, which I'd shared on my personal Instagram account, but not here. This is the first of these, and I'm sharing it here today because I thought we could all use some chocolate chip cookies this week!  I only ask that you excuse me, as for many of these photos, I don't have many details on which recipe I used.

Ghuraybat Lawz (Almond & Tahini Cookies)

These cookies are from a recipe in Habeeb Salloum's Classic Vegetarian Cooking from the Middle East and North Africa. These are a little different than the usual ghurayba, which are like shortbread. These contain tahini, ground almonds, eggs, and baking powder, in addition to flour and sugar. They also contain coconut oil, as a substitute for butter, and I added in some salt for flavor. As they are never very sweet, I added extra sugar this time, in the form of confectioner's sugar, which was a big help. I really enjoyed the cookies, and it was also fun to make them pretty, this way! 

I took the opportunity to test out one of my new cookie stamps, as I thought these were the right kind of cookie for the test. To prevent the cookie dough from sticking, I dipped the stamp in confectioner's sugar and coated it well, before stamping each cookie on a plate. This worked very well, but stamping directly on the parchment-lined baking sheet, caused the dough to stick to the stamp. I hope that helps with using this kind of cookie stamp!

Hamantashen (filled cookie-pastries) with Peach Preserves

These were made with the Easy Hamantaschen Dough recipe from Kitchen Tested. (Peach preserves were store-bought.) This recipe was so highly-recommended by Peas Love & Carrots on Instagram Stories that I had to check it out; since it was oil-based, I really wanted to try it. It was simple to mix into a dough, and the filled hamantashen didn't fall apart, open up, or ooze filling while baking. Very successful! And delicious. 

Many recipes that I’ve seen are based on butter, margarine, and/or shortening, none of which I can eat. So, I just substitute oil and adjust the amount of fat. It was nice this time to not have to adjust the recipe. In fact, it worked very well, probably because it was designed for using oil. Great recipe!

Kitchen Tested Website, Easy Hamantaschen Dough

@kitchentested Instagram, March 9, Hamantashen made with Easy Hamantaschen Dough

Kitchen Tested Fan Page Facebook

Peas Love & Carrots Facebook

Hamantashen (Cookie-pastries)

#tbt to March: Hamantashen, filled cookie-pastries. (More than a cookie, fancy like a pastry.) Traditional fillings are made with poppy seeds or certain fruit. I'm lazy, and so much effort goes into rolling, cutting, filling, and shaping them, that I just use store-bought jam. I think this time, it was seedless raspberry. This was the first time that several didn't flop open and ooze jam all over the parchment. Usually they look like space aliens from a faraway galaxy that have invaded Earth. I hope this means that I'm improving!

Milk Cookies

I guess you could call these Milk Cookies. They are based on the Eggnog Cookies recipe from the Domestic Geek, as part of her Instagram Stories cookies recipes. As I have to be careful what I eat, I often have to modify recipes like this. So, I used homemade sweetened condensed milk (from recipe by Gemma Stafford's Bigger Bolder Baking) instead of eggnog, oil instead of butter (and 1/2 the amount), one whole egg instead of two yolks, and no nutmeg. Fortunately, the cookie was able to accommodate these updates, and turned out soft and melt-in-your-mouth! I used a small cookie-scoop and baked them in two batches for 8-10 minutes each, for about 4 dozen cookies.

Bigger Bolder Baking Website, How to Make Condensed Milk

Bigger Bolder Baking Website, How to Make Dairy-Free Condensed Milk

The Domestic Geek Facebook

The Domestic Geek YouTube

Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

This recipe was originally from a Gold Medal Flour cookbook from 1979. However, it's very close to the Toll House Chocolate Chip Pan Cookie (cookie bars) recipe I found online. I did use oil rather than butter, and about half as much (which I've found you can do, when you use oil instead of butter in baking, in many cases).

Very Best Baking by Nestle Website, Original Nestle Toll House Chocolate Chip Pan Cookie 

Saffron Butter Cookies

These cookies were from a recipe by TheIndianClaypot . They were very simple to make. The saffron really made the cookies so tasty. I substituted oil, as I can't have butter, and dissolved the saffron in hot water, so these cookies in the photo are vegan. (They don't contain eggs.) They reminded me of Indian nankhatai & Middle Eastern ghorayeba cookies. I enjoyed them so much, and they were so easy to make, that I'm sure I'll make them again!