Sunday, September 11, 2005

Orange, Cardamom & Brandy Biscuits


In Bill Granger's Book "Bill's Open Kitchen" these are known as Orange & Cardamom biscuits, but after I had a go at them, these were most definitely brandy flavoured. In fact, these smell like Christmas! They taste a bit like a cross between German lebkuchen (gingerbread) and the brandy sauce I make to pour over our pudding. They are seriously good, and even my mum who easily resists nibbling on sweets, kept going back for a few more taste tests.

I've just spent a weekend baking up a storm for my friend's hen's party next Saturday and I finally have a backlog of posts ready. A few weeks ago mum came home with a cheap copy of the Bill Granger book I mentioned. She knew that I wasn't really taken by the hype surrounding him but the book was so cheap that she grabbed it. And I do have to eat my words, because I have been quite taken by his sweets and baking recipes, which are very good. I'm still not completely enamoured of his dinner/lunch recipes because theyr'e a bit too 'Sydney/Gold Coast' - i.e. light, salady, grilled type things you can cook on a BBQ and eat on a verandah. I live in Melbourne. That sort of stuff is not so suitable for us here most of the year! But, he has a chapter on Afternoon Tea in this book, and I've picked up about four recipes that I'm making for the hen's party. That's a good strike rate for one book.

The name of these biscuits didn't grab me at first, but reading through the ingedients sparked my interest: oranges, ginger, nutmeg, cardamom, brown sugar and brandy. Ooooh...that sounds kinda interesting. And the photo looked appetising, so I gave them a go. I had a bit of trouble with the dough being too crumbly, so I had to add more liquid, and I chose that in the form of more brandy. Hey, what kind of hen's party is it without alcohol?? Because of the extra brandy, the biscuits had a fabulous aroma and full, buttery, spicy taste. The cardamom doesn't really come through, but there is a strong taste of ginger and orange.

For the past two years I've made biscuits at Christmas to hand around to friends. Two years ago I made excellent lebkuchen from a recipe I accidentally threw away (bugger. It came from NZ Cuisine magazine, Dec 2003....anyone have one??), and last year I made Jeanne's Dutch spiced wine cookies. This year, I've already decided. I'm making these. They look good and taste bloody awesome! And who can resist a bit of brandy and spice at Christmas?
In fact, these were so good, I even baked the offcuts of dough that weren't worth rolling out again, and I took them to my concert last night, to offer around at interval. I really endorse these to you; give them a go!
Read on for the recipe:


Orange, Cardamom & Brandy Biscuits
from 'Bill's Open Kitchen', Bill Granger

375g (3 cups) plain (ap) flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg (try to grate your own. It's much more aromatic)

1 teaspoon ground cardamom
250g (9 oz) butter, softened

345g (1 1/2 cups) brown sugar
3 teaspoons brandy (I used about 3-4 tablespoons in mine)
finely grated zest of 1 orange
30g (1/4) cup plain flour, extra
1 egg white, for glazing
30g (1/4 cup) granulated sugar

Preheat the oven to 180C (350F)
Sift the flour, baking powder, ginger, nutmeg and cardamom into a large bowl. Place the butter and brown sugar in a bowl and beat until pale and creamy. Add the brandy and zest and mix well. Using a large metal spoon, fold the dry ingredients through in two batches. Sift the extra flour over a clean, dry surface and knead the dough for 30 seconds (I had serious crumbling issues here - splash on the brandy!). Roll the dough into a large rectangle 5mm (1/4 inch) thick. Cut into shapes 3x6cm (1 1/4 x 2/ 1/2 inches) long. Brush with the egg white and sprinkle with sugar.
Place the biscuits 2cm (3/4 inches) apart on a baking tray lined with baking paper. Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until lightly browned. Remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack.
Makes ~40.

Note: Don't overbake these. I cooked mine for 11 minutes, and they are just slightly too hard. Next time I will probably take them out at 9 or 10 minutes and they'll be perfect.

40 comments:

  1. A definite candidate for my annual Cookie Swap coming up in December!

    ReplyDelete
  2. These cookies sound really good. I've also noticed that you changed the picture in your profile and now have a cookie picture. Are those the perfect CCC you are striving for? (Just kidding!)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yum, these go straight on the "recipes to try" list. Sounds perfect for colder months.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Niki - those cookies look so good! How much cardamom do they call for (it's not listed)? Is that something you'd increase next time around with the hopes that the taste would come through, or do you not miss it? I'd really like to try these - I'm going to have to buy some brandy!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Like you, the title of the recipe doesnt appeal but the ingredients are quite appealing! Will give this a try closer to wintertime.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Honestly, I tried to avoid the Bill Granger hype as well, but his recipes are by far the most reliable of any cookbook author I have come across.

    ReplyDelete
  7. ak - Yes, I thought they'd be perfect for cookie swaps. They're not fragile, and very tasty.

    Ana - Yes, I changed the phot; It's one I entered in a DMBLGIT a few months ago of some passionfruit banana muffins. I like the strong colours in it! I have a long way for me to get a picture of my perfect CCCs!

    Cin - oh, yes. Do!

    Anne - I bet a few of us have a 'recipes to try' list! I have a 'baking recipes' task on my MS Outlook! I think you'll like these biscuits; to me they taste quite European.

    AG - Glad to be of service!

    Cathy - oops! Yes, you're right. I did leave out the cardamom in the ingredients. I've now altered it. I probably would increase the cardamom slightly, because I think the flavour would work well with it. Just as equally you could leave it out and just use the other spices. And yes, I had to go out and buy a bottle of brandy for these! I usually have one in the cupboard, for when I make pate, but I took it to my friend's cocktail party a few weeks ago, and it was used for Brandy Alexanders!!

    Tanvi - It's a good example of never judge a book by it's cover etc.etc.! Yes, I think they're a good cold-weather biscuit.

    be_zen8 - Yes, I have a bit of a thing about resisting his hype. Actually, he seems bigger overseas than in Australia, but slowly I'm taking to him. I have been quite vocal about avoiding him in the past! Pure obstinancy, I guess.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Okay... these biscuits look so good! The idea of mixing all of ths flavors is definetly intriguing!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Using the brandy to hold the crumbs sounds like a stroke of genius!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Niki --

    I diligently searched the archives of NZ Cuisine Magazine for December and November of 2003, but no lebkuchen. The archives did offer, however, pistachio and cardamom cookies which sound delightful! Could these be the cookies you to which you refer?

    I'll try to email the recipe to you.

    ReplyDelete
  11. These look and sound fantastic! I'm planning to have a big festive baking bonanza this Christmas so I'll put these on the list.

    (Thank goodness for air conditioning otherwise I'd never cook at all during summer!)

    ReplyDelete
  12. Joe - Yep, very spicy and liquory!

    Owen - don't you know it!!

    LIsa Marie - thank you for the link. That does sound like a good one. Yes, I've already checked the Cuisine archives, but the recipe I used was embedded in a multi-page article profiling how different New Zealanders spend their Christmas holidays and what foods they eat; I got the recipe from the story about a young, female pastry chef with an Eastern European (?) or German background, and that was the recipe she gave for her family's special Christmas tradition food.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Kelly - I remember making my lebjuchen a few years ago with two fans going either side of me trying to keep things cool. I'd love to experience Christmas in the cold weather; it'd be SO weird!

    ReplyDelete
  14. Ok - tried it!! :) Niki, I have to say - I love them. And I was in the worst mood baking.. it was all worth it, but I had quite a tough time. First, the dough didn't smell great. I had very little hope for the cookies, but went on. Second, I didn't have time to roll them out straight away, so I stuck the dough in the fridge, vaguely thinking that that usually made doughs easier to roll out. Oh. Not this one. Oh. Ok. Finally got it rolled out, and then made another mistake - hey, since it's all rolled.. I'll make shapes. Um. Not a good idea, because no, these don't hold their shapes very well. I have a whole lot of somewhat-heart-shaped blobs.

    Finally, I got sick of rolling and cutting (this made over 100 cookies for me!!) so I shaped the remaining dough into a square log, sliced, placed, brushed and sugared - and wow, worked like a charm so that's what I'll do from the start the next time. And there will indeed be a next time because these turned out awfully yummy! A *lot* better than I would've thought from just the dough. Mmm.. got to go eat more now. Just wanted to report. :)

    ReplyDelete
  15. Anne -- oops. You're right; I should have indicated that this recipe makes an enormous yield. I had biscuits coming out of my ears. I think a half quantity would be better.
    I also had problems getting the dough to stick together, which is why I added the extra brandy - and loved the taste!
    I just rolled my dough into an enormous rectangle and cut lines through it to make little rectangle shapes, which was pretty quick, but I do like the idea of forming a log and cutting them that way. I might try that formula next time (I'm planning to make these for the next Bogging By Mail!)

    ReplyDelete
  16. Niki, I went ahead and added 3 tbsp of brandy right off the bat, and had no crumbling problems. If anything, it was a wee bit sticky to roll out. I tried cutting, but I think I made mine a bit thin and it was hard getting them off the surface without being.. umm.. warped. Anyway, finally came out great and I *do* love them. Mine are a bit chewy-crunchy, and mmm.. I also added more orange than specified - a little bit more, I think. I used two oranges but just the very top layer. They're very very orangey, anyway :) Thank you SO much for this recipe, I know it's going to be a huge hit at the meeting I'm bringing them for. :)

    ReplyDelete
  17. The recipe I am going to share with you today is about 350 years old! A great favourite from the Cape where the first brandy from Cape grapes were distilled in 1672! We have come a very long way since then when it comes to the quality of our brandy, but still, Cape Brandy Pudding remains an old time favourite :) Growing up in South Africa is great fun with all the recipes your mother makes and teaches you during your younger years!

    ReplyDelete
  18. I think it goes without saying that you have to be interested in the kind of life we live.
    --------------------------------------
    That is, You don't have to use cloth tp, but we're not interested in seeing our power usage triple, either. If you come here, you'll be living with me, the whack-job environmentalist who periodically tries to argue her husband into turning the main power off entirely - forever. So far, he's winning the fight, and obviously other people will get votes on that too, but I would assume that you wouldn't be insane enough to want to share my home unless you were also into cutting your emissions and fossil fuel usage, Peak aware, and didn't mind having a crazy lady wander over for tea and a rant about the latest emissions stats.

    ReplyDelete
  19. We have a 1000 square foot downstairs apartment, extremely well insulated, with a new Soapstone wood stove. It has a bedroom, galley kitchen and living room, as well as a freakishly large bathroom, and a sun porch. There are also,
    --------------------------------------
    adjoining in the "main" part of the house two additional small bedrooms with intersecting bathroom that might be added to the deal. Or we could just have the whole house open to everyone and divvy up space in other ways, depending on inclination.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Our ideal candidates would probably be people in a similar stage of life as ours, with young kids of their own (mine are now 7 1/2, 6, not quite 4 and 2), because you'll be used to noise, mess and chaos. We're willing to consider other people, but if you haven't lived in a farm family with small kids and pets, you might be surprised how disruptive it is.
    --------------------------------------
    We're happy to share land, house and resources, including animals, and would love to share farm work with you. The people we imagine would be extremely flexible, fun to be around, patient with me and the kids (my husband is easy), not too neat, or at least tolerant of us (we're slobs), handy (we're not especially), and interested in building a partly communal, partly separate arrangment, and willing to make delicate negotiations between privacy and sharing.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Money is up for discussion - this isn't primarily about money for us. So are long term possibilities for working out a legal stake for people we've proved we can live and work with in this land. Our goal is to make friends, share values with people, make change in our area, and pool our resources - we're open to some barter and possible ways of sharing expenses. We're trying very hard to bring our place up to speed for the coming crisis, and people who want to share in that project are essential.
    --------------------------------------
    Living out in the country the way we do can be isolating, and we have more than we need right now - while some kind of economic arrangement will be necessary, we're flexible, and having friends and people to share the work with right here would be valuable to us. Trust me, you'll be expected to kick in, but we're not shooting to make a profit here.

    ReplyDelete
  22. http://www.gencsenpaylas.com http://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.comhttp://www.gencsenpaylas.com

    ReplyDelete
  23. These cookies sound really good. I've also noticed that you changed the picture in your profile and now have a cookie picture. Are those the perfect CCC you are striving for? (Just kidding!)
    http://www.sanaldiyarim.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=35

    ReplyDelete
  24. http://www.duvvar.com

    ReplyDelete
  25. başarılı site teşekkürler bol paylaşımlar

    ReplyDelete
  26. Yum, these go straight on the "recipes to try" list. Sounds perfect for colder months.

    ReplyDelete

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.