I've had my eye on this cookie recipe all week. There were 3 things that excited me about this recipe:
1) That you turn the dough into logs to slice up nice & neatly
2) The brown sugar content
3) Their pale prettiness
Would it sound weird to say that I wasn't overly excited about what they might taste like, and I was more interested in the baking process? I made these cookies to take to school, so doubled the original quantities and gave my Kenwood Chef quite the work out with the amount of butter, sugars and flour it needed to mix. As always, Kenwood did his job with great finesse.
Another thing I liked about this recipe was that I could make these cookies ahead of time, so they fitted in perfectly with my schedule this week. I prepared the dough on Wednesday evening (the perfect way to get out of a post-work slump), chilled overnight, then took to Hannah's house to bake on Thursday afternoon, ready for school on Friday.
White Chocolate & Pecan Cookies
ingredients (yields 24 cookies)
250g unsalted butter (at room temperature)
100g caster sugar
200g soft light brown sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
400g plain (all-purpose) flour
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp baking powder
100g white chocolate, chopped
100g pecans, chopped
1) Put the butter and sugars into a bowl & beat until light and fluffy.
2) Add the eggs one at a time, beating each in well.
3) Add vanilla extract & combine
4) Add flour, salt & baking powder (no need to sieve) and combine
5) Stir in the chocolate & nuts and evenly disperse
6) Divide the dough in half, shape into logs and wrap in clingfilm
I found the most straightforward way of doing this was to put the dough on greaseproof paper to shape into a log before transferring to the cling film, as it is quite sticky at this stage.
7) Chill for a couple of hours in the freezer, or until you are ready to bake.
8) Preheat oven at 170C / gas mark 3 /325F
9) Slice the logs up into pieces 1cm diameter then lay circles flat on a greased baking sheet, leaving plenty of space in between each cookie.
{When taking photos, I like to use the best available light, wherever that may be. On this occasion, it was in Hannah's conservatory in the middle of the floor. I had a little helper, as you can see, so it only seemed right that she got to be in the photo too with those lovely little feet poised so perfectly on the threshold.}
10) Bake for 15 minutes or until the cookies are starting to become golden around the edges.
11) Leave cookies to cool & harden slightly on baking trays before transferring to cooling racks (approx. 3 - 5 mins).
12) Eat & share with anyone in the near vacinity!
Baking notes:
I'd like to try this recipe again and make more of the brown sugar flavour by using 50g of caster sugar instead of 100g. I think this dough would work well with chocolate chips instead of white choc & pecans, so I might try using it as a base dough again sometime.
{On another note entirely, does anyone know why blogger crops the right side of my photos? In draft mode, they are perfectly cropped, then when I publish each post, it looks like I've done some slightly funky cropping. If you can shed any light on this, please do share your wisdom in the comments section.}
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