It’s not a party if there’s no honeycrunch!

When I was growing up in the seventies in New Zealand, Rice Krispies seemed to be one foodstuff that every family had in their kitchen.  Whenever a kid had a birthday party, along with little red “cheerio” sausages on sticks and Bluebird chips, there would always be a Rice Krispie offering on the table in the form of honeycrunch bars or chocolate crackles . They fulfilled every desire of the parent and children at that time.  For the parents, they were cheap, quick to make, and could easily be whipped up in large quantities. For the kids, they were sweet, sweet, sweet; which is all a small child needs from a party really.  The hyperactive sugar rush they get from these treats can power them through hours of running around madly and shrieking excitedly. Kids who are served carrot sticks and hummus at parties don’t realize what they’re missing!

A very forgiving recipe

Aside from the non-politically-correct sugar rush honeycrunch gives, they are fun to make with kids as there is not much to making it.  The recipe is very forgiving.  The butter, sugar, and honey mixture should theoretically be boiled until it it changes to an amber colour as you see in the photos below.  If you don’t boil it for long enough, the taste will be a little less caramel-like, and the honeycrunch bars will be a little softer rather than crunchier. No matter how they come out, they will taste good.

The one thing not to do when making honeycrunch

The only thing you should not do is boil the mixture for too long, as it can get a burnt taste, which is the one time when honeycrunch doesn’t actually taste very nice. Oh, there’s one other thing that you should not do: do not eat it all at once, otherwise you’ll turn into an over-excited 5 year old at a birthday party.

And honeycrunch is not just a party food

Actually, it’s not true that we only ate it at parties.  My mother made it often so that it could be popped into our school lunch-boxes as a treat after we’d finished our Marmite sandwiches.  It’s amazing how many kids suddenly want to be your friend when you pull a couple of bars of home-made honeycrunch out of your lunchbox!

Travel photo of the week

This photo is taken on my father’s farm in New Zealand.  The trees on the right are the beginning of a large area of preserved forest (or “bush” as it’s called in NZ). Dad has put up fences all around it to stop cattle and sheep from straying in there, in order to keep it as pristine as possible.  It’s so dense that we were forbidden completely from setting foot in it.  When I was little I imagined that witches and goblins had houses hiding in these trees. In fact, Dad got lost in there himself many years ago.  He ordered his dogs to “Go home” so that he could follow them, and they just slunk around behind him and stayed at his heels.  Mum had all the neighbours out searching for him to no avail, but he found his way out after a night of stumbling around.  Take that as a cautionary tale:  the New Zealand bush is VERY easy to become lost in.  Even people like my Dad, who have a good idea of what they’re doing can lose their way very quickly!

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Honeycrunch from New Zealand

Honeycrunch bars are a sweet treat from New Zealand that can be made quickly with only 4 ingredients!

Course cake, Dessert, party food

Cuisine New Zealand

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Cook Time 5 minutes minutes

Resting time 1 hour hour

Total Time 1 hour hour 10 minutes minutes

Servings 16 bars

Ingredients

• 100 g Rice Krispies 4 cups
• 100 g Butter 1/2 cup
• 85 g honey 4 Tbsp
• 50 g sugar 4 Tbsp

Instructions

• Grease a baking tin with sides. I used a 20 x 20 cm tin for this recipe. (That's 8 in x 8 in)
• Heat the butter, sugar, and honey in a medium-sized pot on a medium heat. Let the mixture boil gently, and stir frequently for 5 minutes, until the colour begins to darken slightly.
• Take off the heat and stir in the Rice Krispies.
• Scrape into the prepared tin. Gently spread the mixture out with a spatula or spoon. Do not press down hard.
• Cut into slices while still warm. Leave to set for at least one hour.

By Lisa Watson

The recipe that was used around the world

This cookie recipe was given to me years ago by a well-traveled friend of mine who, at some time in the past, had met a woman called Pam when she was visiting Borneo. Pam gave her this cookie recipe. My friend carried on with her travels and lost touch with Pam.  Eventually, after a few years of wandering the globe, she ended up living in France for a while, which is where I met her. At that point, she passed Pam’s cookie recipe on to me.  I never got to meet Pam, or find out anything about her, but I often make her cookies and think about who she might be and where she could be in the world. Her cookie recipe has been carried like an Olympic torch all over the world, and now I am passing it on to you.

Who knows, maybe if it keeps being shared, one day it will end up back in the hands of Pam!

I love Pam’s cookie recipe as it is

1. very easy to throw together,
2. there are no waiting times (except for waiting for the cookies to cool off so that you can eat one without burning your fingers),
3. and it is very versatile. You can substitute vegetable shortening for butter (in fact the original recipe doesn’t use butter), and you can add different combinations of chocolate, nuts or raisins, depending what is in your cupboard.

What Pam’s cookie dough should look like

The above photo shows what the cookie dough consistency should look like at the end.  If it is a bit dry, add water, one teaspoon at a time until the dough sticks together.  I find that using your hands to mix in the chocolate chips or nuts works best for getting them to spread evenly through the dough. For this batch, I chopped a couple of chocolate bars into pieces as I had forgotten to buy chocolate chips.  It tastes just as good!  It just means that you have more work to cut the chocolate into bits.  The advantage is that you get to eat all the scraps that fall off the chocolate pieces.

Ideas for different combinations to change your cookies

In the recipe I have written to add 1 cup of chocolate chips, but if you want to mix things up a little, here are some ideas of combinations you could add:

• ​dark and white chocolate chunks or chips
• chocolate pieces and chopped pecans
• chocolate and chopped almonds
• dark chocolate and chopped hazelnuts
• white chocolate and dried cranberries
• raisins and chopped walnuts
• two types of chopped nuts
• chopped dried apricots and chopped unsalted pistachios

Your imagination is your only limit!  Just make sure that the fruits, nuts, and/or chocolate pieces are all roughly the same size.

Travel photo of the week

Since the friend who gave me the recipe spend a couple of years living on Vancouver Island, I thought that I would show you one of my favourite beaches in the world (aside from the New Zealand ones of course!).  This is Long Beach on the west coast of Vancouver Island. You can see where it got it’s not very imaginative name from. The beach is enormous and wild, and if you’re lucky, or unlucky depending on your opinion, you can come across one of the many of black bears who live on the island.  They regularly scour the beach for food.

By Lisa Watson

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Pam's Biscuits

Course cookies, sweet

Cuisine American

Prep Time 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 30 cookies

Ingredients

• 120 g butter or shortening 1/2 cup
• 25 g white granulated sugar 1/4 cup
• 100 g dark brown sugar 1/2 cup
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 240 g flour 2 cups
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 150 g chocolate chips 1 cup

Instructions

• Heat the oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F).

  With either a standing mixer, or a handheld mixer, cream the butter and sugar together until the mixture becomes pale and fluffy.

  If you don't have a mixer, use your very strong arm to beat them with a wooden spoon.

  
  
  
• Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt into the bowl with the creamed butter-sugar mixture.
  
  Use a wooden spoon or a silicone spatula to mix everything together until you get a homogeneous mixture.
• Add the chocolate chunks, and chopped nuts if using. Mix them in gently. I find that it is better to use your hands at this stage to mix the chocolate chunks in uniformly.
  
  
  
  
  
• Line a cookie sheet with baking paper.

  Use a teaspoon, or your hands, to take walnut-sized pieces off the dough.

  Roll each lump into a ball and place it on the cookie sheet.

  Squash each ball with a fork to flatten it out.

  
  
  
  
• Bake the cookies for 10 -  12 minutes until they start to turn a slightly golden-brown color. 

  Take the cookie tray out of the oven and leave the cookies to cool on it for 10 minutes.

  Take the cookies off the tray and leave them on a wire cooling-rack to cool completely.

  
  
  
  

Notes

Pam's cookies will keep well in a sealed container for up to 5 days (though they have never lasted that long at our house.  They often get eaten hot off the cookie tray!).

Chocolate Crackles: essential New Zealand party food

When I was growing up in New Zealand in the Seventies, every single birthday party I went to would have a plate of chocolate crackles sitting proudly on the party food table, just waiting to be gobbled by sugar-frenzied, over-excited herds of children. The Seventies seem to be coming back into fashion (to the fashion powers that be, please don’t bring back lamé jumpsuits…..), so I decided to resurrect this old childhood favourite.

And why is the coconut there?

Chocolate Crackles are incredibly easy to make and do not need any cooking, except for melting the butter, so could happily be made with just the use of a microwave. They also have very few ingredients in them, which is probably how some beleaguered parent who had to make some sweet treat in a hurry for their child’s birthday party came up with the idea in the first place: by looking in their kitchen cupboard and throwing what was in there into a pot.  It seems that even a Century ago in New Zealand, most kitchens had a steady supply of dried coconut in them, although coconut palms do not actually grow in the country itself.  I’m still not sure why coconut is such a ubiquitous ingredient in cake and cookie recipes in New Zealand.  My guess is that it was something that kept for months without refrigeration back before aeroplanes existed, so it was an easy ingredient to store.

The origin of chocolate crackles

The first known recipe was actually printed in the Australian Women’s Weekly back in 1937, so this is one Antipodean recipe that I will have to let the Australians own (unlike pavlova). Apparently it was used as a marketing tool to sell a product called Copha; a solid fat made of hydrogenated coconut oil. Kellogg’s jumped on the candy-train in the Fifties, as a main ingredient in the recipe for chocolate crackles was one of their cereals, and took ownership of the name “chocolate crackles”.  They tripped and fell flat on their cereal-covered face when they attempted to trademark the recipe a few decades later. Since recipes can’t be owned by any one person or company, their bid failed completely.

You can use butter

As I don’t like the idea of using a vegetable shortening with trans-fats in it, I replaced the Copha with butter.  The crackles came out just fine and the Rice Krispies stuck together nicely, just like I remember them doing with the vegetable shortening that was used in the past.

Travel photo of the week

As I have sadly confessed that this recipe for chocolate crackles is not an original New Zealand recipe, I have decided that Australia should be featured in this week’s travel photo section.  This is a bustling beach in Queensland, Australia called Mission Beach.  We were there in August, which is Winter, but it was warm enough to go swimming, and there were no jellyfish, no cyclones, and no people to be seen anywhere.

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Chocolate Crackles

Easy to make crunchy Chocolate Crackles will be a hit at any child's party and are fun to prepare with kids as well. Find the Antipodean recipe here on Italian Kiwi.

Course Dessert, party food

Cuisine New Zealand

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Cook Time 2 minutes minutes

Fridge time 2 hours hours

Total Time 7 minutes minutes

Servings 12 crackles

Ingredients

• 125 g butter 4.4 oz
• 30 g cocoa 1/4 cup
• 70 g icing sugar (powdered sugar) 1/2 cup
• 40 g dried shredded coconut 1/2 cup
• 60 g Rice bubbles (rice crispies) 2 cups

Instructions

• Put paper muffin cases into a muffin pan.
• Melt the butter in a medium-sized pot.
• Turn off the heat.  Add the cocoa and stir until dissolved.
• Add the icing sugar and stir in.
• Add the coconut and mix in.
• Add the rice bubbles and mix gently until they are all coated with the chocolate mixture.
• Spoon the rice bubbles into the paper cases.  Put the muffin pan in the fridge for at least two hours before eating the crackles.

By Lisa Watson

Candy surprise from Down-Under

I had forgotten all about hokey pokey until recently when we went down to visit my family in New Zealand.  Suddenly I saw it everywhere: in ice-cream, in biscuits, in chocolate and even by itself.  It’s New Zealand’s best kept secret (or maybe second best, after the fact that NZ has beaches to rival those in the Caribbean).  I have never seen it outside of the country. As far as I know, they don’t even make it in Australia, which is astonishing as those Australians are always stealing our recipes (look at pavlova, marmite, anzac biscuits…….the list goes on).  Now, for any Australians reading this, don’t worry….you still have your kangaroo meat pies and crocodile steaks all for you. 🙂

I have discovered in my travels that there is a kind of candy called honeycomb in the UK that is similar, but it doesn’t seem to be as ubiquitous as in NZ. There, you find it everywhere : coated in chocolate, in ice-cream, and made at home and in school science labs all over the country.

Fast and fun to make

Hokey pokey takes about five minutes to make and only has three ingredients.  It’s lots of fun to make with kids as it has that “WOW!” factor when you add the baking soda to the sugar syrup.  If the baking soda is fresh, it’ll foam up very impressively.  I remember making it in science class at high school to study the reaction.  Well, I mainly remember eating it, but not much about the explanation behind the reaction. The science lab bit is because of the fantastic foaming reaction between the hot caramel syrup and baking soda that you add at the end to make the holes in the candy. 

Let’s do the Hokey Pokey

Hokey Pokey is also the name of a dance.  One that you probably did on camp, or when you were at school.  Some call it the Hokey Cokey, but I like to think that it’s related to this sweet somehow. Maybe the original makers of hokey pokey, sang the accompanying song, “You put your right foot in. You put your right foot out. In, out, in ,out and wave it all about” while they were waiting for it to cool down.

Very important tips to know

There are only a few important things to remember when making hokey pokey:

1. Stir the sugar when it’s melting, otherwise it will burn.

2. After adding the baking soda, scrape it IMMEDIATELY onto a plate as it sets very quickly.

3. Don’t touch it until it has cooled down, otherwise you will get burned.  It sticks to your skin very easily when its hot.

4. Wash all the tools you use to make it straight away as the caramel sticks to everything otherwise.

The last two points come from personal experience.  I tried it so you don’t have to!

That’s about it.  Once you’ve made it, it will keep for a few days in an airtight container.  You may find though that it will be already eaten after a few minutes!

If you’re looking for other sweet treats from New Zealand don’t hesitate to check out mothballs and russian fudge.

I’m happy to announce that my post for hokey pokey won 2nd prize in a contest on the site Instructables.  It’s a fabulous site for learning how to make any sort of craft you can think of!

Contest Winner

Second Prize in the Sweet Treats Challenge

By Lisa Watson

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Hokey Pokey Candy

A three ingredient candy and a fun science experiment, all rolled into one!

Course Snack

Cuisine New Zealand

Prep Time 2 minutes minutes

Cook Time 5 minutes minutes

Total Time 7 minutes minutes

Ingredients

• 140 g White Sugar 10 Tbsp
• 50 g Golden Syrup 4 Tbsp
• 2 tsp Baking soda

Instructions

• Grease a plate or pie dish.
• Heat the sugar and golden syrup in a medium-sized pot at a medium-low temperature.  Stir constantly with a wooden spoon or a whisk until the sugar has melted.
  
• Simmer on a medium-low heat for 5 minutes, stirring continuously, until it turns a golden amber colour. If you have a candy thermometer, wait until the temperature gets to 145 - 150 degrees C (293 - 303 degrees F).
  
• Take the pot off the heat and immediately add the baking soda.  Stir madly and watch it foam up (very exciting for the kids!).
  
• Pour it STRAIGHT AWAY on to the greased plate/dish and leave it to become cold and set. DO NOT TOUCH IT WHEN IT'S HOT (it'll stick to your fingers and burn you).
  
• When it has cooled, break it into pieces and eat it!

Strauben: Sugar-dusted swirls from Northern Italy

I came across these delicious fried treats a few years ago when we went to the Dolomite mountains in the North-East of Italy.  There’s nothing better than a crunchy-tender freshly fried pastry dusted with powdered sugar  or lavishly spread with jam (traditionally it’s blueberry jam) to give you a warm fuzzy feeling! These fried pastries are fun to make at home too as you can get the hidden artist in you to come out and make fantastical swirls and curls of batter before it cooks into a solid shape in the oil. Strauben were originally made in February during the Carnevale period where people dress up in costumes, eat and party before having to give everything up for Lent.  Nowadays, you can find strauben at markets and festivals all through the year when you go to the Trentino-Alto Adige area of Italy, or you can use this recipe and just go ahead and make them at home whenever you feel like it.

Creating art with Strauben batter

In fact, the only slightly tricky part of this recipe is making the batter spiral into the hot oil.  To do this, I used a funnel as you can see in the photo below.  It’s a little messy as you get batter on the finger that’s plugging the funnel hole.  You also have to keep cool, calm and collected and start gently making swirls as soon as the batter starts flowing into the oil.  If you are finding that the batter is too runny and is flowing too quickly to make any kind of meaningful swirl, just add flour to the mixture, 2 Tbsp at a time and see how that goes.  After a few tries, you’ll get it down to a fine art and be able to create masterpieces of batter-y art!

This post is part of the monthly Cucina Conversations theme.  This month,  as Carnival is being celebrated all over Italy, the recipes are special for this time of the year.  Strauben are traditionally eaten during Carnaval in the Trentino-Alto Adige region , but are so good that you’ll find them throughout the year and festivals and markets in the area.  So, here’s a tempting list of this month’s recipes written just for you:

Daniela from La Dani Gourmet made a very special risotto with Cuttlefish and Chard

Rosemarie  from Turin Mamma baked some summery Parmigiana di Zucchini

Francesca from Pancakes And Biscotti  made delicious freind balls from Sardinia called Zeppole Sarde

Marialuisa from Marmellata e Cipolli fried up some mouthwatering Doughnuts

Flavia from Flavia’s Flavors tempted us with crunchy Crostoli

Carmen from The Heirloom Chronicles made some sweet Bugie stuffed with apricot jam.

Travel Photo Of The Week

This photo shows you the very typical architecture from the Alto Adige region of Italy.  The buildings look very Swiss, and very unlike buildings I have seen anywhere else in Italy.  This was taken in a tiny village called Versciaco or Verschach, depending on whether you want to call it by its Italian or German name.  All the towns in the area have two names, which can make it very confusing for strangers visiting there.  I wrote a while back about this interesting bilingual area . When you go to speak to someone there, you never know whether they will speak Italian or German.  Often the German-speakers speak poor Italian, even though they are Italians, and the Italian speakers speak poor German, even though they live in a German speaking area.  If that doesn’t confuse you, then nothing will! Anyway, if you do find yourself in this village, and are hungry, I absolutely recommend the Pizzeria and Restaurant Helmhotel, on the main road).  They have great Italian pizzas, and also wonderful South Tyrolean specialties.

By Lisa Watson

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Strauben swirls

Strauben are Italy's answer to American funnel cakes. Find out how to make these delicious treats at home.

Course Dessert

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes minutes

Total Time 15 minutes minutes

Servings 6 Strauben

Ingredients

• 200 g Flour 7 oz/ 1 3/4 cups
• 3 Eggs
• 70 g Melted Butter 2.5 oz/ 5 Tbsp
• 50 g Sugar 1.7 oz/ 1/4 cup
• 1 pinch Salt
• 250 ml Milk 1 cup + 2 Tbsp
• 20 ml Grappa or Rum (optional) 1 1/2 Tbsp
• Vegetable oil

Instructions

• Whisk all the dry ingredients together.
• Melt the butter and leave it to cool slightly while whisking the eggs and milk into the dry ingredients.
• Whisk in the butter and grappa, if using.
• Pour approximately 5 cm (2 in) of oil into a large pot or wok.  Heat the oil.
• Using a funnel, place your finger on the end of it and fill the funnel with batter until it comes about halfway up the funnel.
• Put the funnel above the heated oil and swirl the funnel gently in circles as the batter pours out.
• Leave for a couple of minutes to cook on one side and then flip it carefully and brown on the other side.
• Drain on paper towels, the sprinkle with powdered sugar or spread jam on the strauben before eating.

Notes

The Strauben are best eaten hot, but they can be easily reheated in an un-oiled, non-stick frying pan up to 3 days after making them.

Where you can find pasticciotti custard pies

I first came across pasticciotti a few years ago, when we spent a long weekend  in the Salento region, way down in the “heel” of Italy. These custard-filled pies are typically eaten for breakfast there with a frothy cappuccino.  Of course, there’s nothing stopping you eating pasticciotti at other times of the day! There are a few stories floating around about the origins of this pie.  The thing they have in common is that it was cooked up for the first time in the 1700’s, and that it comes from the region of Puglia.  For the rest, various versions say that the pasticciotti were invented by one chef or the other, all for different reasons.  I’m not sure who to believe, so I’m happy just to eat them and thank that chef who had the great idea to make them back then.

A little name explanation

The word “pasticcio” in Italian means “a mess”, which doesn’t really do the filled pie justice, except for the fact that it can be messy to eat if the crema filling isn’t thick enough. Try wiping up mess of custard filling off your shirt and jeans in a cafe with a small number of flimsy serviettes and no water and you’ll see what I mean (yes, that happened to me). The original dough is made from lard.  I used a butter pastry as I find the lard too heavy for my taste.

Some hints on making pasticciotti

For this recipe, I have given no quantities for the number of pasticciotti it makes as it really depends on the size you end up making them.  they are very rich, so I suggest that you make them no larger than a muffin-tin size, unless you decide to go for a large pie to be cut in pieces. You can make the crema and the dough the day before and keep it in the fridge until you are ready to bake the pies.

Three recipes in one

The most fabulous bit of this recipe for pasticciotti, at least for me, is that I don’t need to write out a lengthy post on how to make the dough or the crema.  The two recipes are already on Italian Kiwi!  The jam tart  I posted as one of the first recipes on this blog uses the pastry dough, and a Summery strawberry tart  I posted a couple of years ago  is filled with the crema pasticciera! So, really, this post is three recipes for the price of one! As you get it for free, I guess that doesn’t mean too much.  This way though, if you have leftover pastry or crema after making the pasticciotti, you have a couple of ideas to use them up by making some other delicious desserts.

It’s the end of the month, which means you get an added bonus of delicious recipes from the group at Cucina Conversations! This month, we’re talking about typical Italian afternoon tea snacks.  I wish every meal could be afternoon tea, or merenda, as it is called in Italy!

Marialuisa from Marmellata di Cipolli baked very interesting Vegetal Charcoal Bread to make sandwiches with,

Rosemarie from Turin Mamma baked some Amaretti Morbidi,

Carmen from The Heirloom Chronicles offered some Pizzette Montanare

Francesca from Pancakes And Biscotti made delicious Pizza Bianca,

Flavia from Flavia’s Flavors put together some little sandwiches typically found all over Italy in cafes called Tramezzini da bar,

Daniela from Le Dani Gourmet will be making Pan Meino

Travel Photo Of The Week

The two photos I have for you this week come from Puglia, where I stuffed my face, I mean first discovered, pasticciotti. These falling-down towers are strung along the coast of Puglia like beads on a necklace.  Once upon a time, they were manned constantly to watch out for attackers approaching from the sea.  Each tower is in sight of one other, so that when the alarm was raised, wither smoke signals, or fires could be used to signal the next tower down the line that danger was imminent. Now-a-days, they make wonderful sites to view the Puglia coastline from.

The stunning white town below, which lies a little bit North of Brindisi, is called Ostuni. I had some incredible orecchiette pasta with turnip greens for lunch here! The architecture is very typical for the Puglia region. You can see the strong influence of past cultures that inhabited the region at different times during its history.  The whitewashing and flat roofs bring back memories of buildings in Northern Africa and on the Greek Islands.

By Lisa Watson

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Pasticciotti: custard-filled pies from Southern Italy

Custrd-filled pies from Puglia in southern Italy can be eaten for breakfast or as a dessert or decadent afternoon tea snack.  Find the recipe here!

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 1 hour hour

Cook Time 20 minutes minutes

Resting time for dough 1 hour hour

Total Time 2 hours hours

Ingredients

• Pasta Frolla
• Crema Pasticciera

Instructions

• Find the recipe for Pasta Frolla here.
• Find the recipe for  Crema Pasticciera here.
• Heat the oven to 180ºC (350ºF).
• Choose your pie pans.  You can use muffin pans, like I did, or opt of a larger shape.  The form should have high sides. Grease the pan before using.
• Roll out the dough until it is about  a 1/4 cm thick. Cut out a round for the base and a smaller round for the top.  As you can see in the photo in the above post, I used a bowl for the base and a cookie cutter shape for the top.
• Carefully place the larger round in the form and gently press it down.
• Add spoonfuls of the crema until you nearly fill it to the top of the pastry round.
• Put the top on, and squeeze the edges together with your fingers.
• If you like, you can brush the top with beaten egg to make it shine when it is cooked (I didn't do this step).
• Bake for 20 - 25 minutes until the pies have become golden-brown.

A Special Cookie From New Zealand

This cookie is for some reason called an Afghan cookie, although it is not from Afghanistan, and is not made by an Afghan dog.  Afghan cookies are a specialty from New Zealand and are one of those sweet treats that you find in just about every cafe you walk into there, just like ginger slice and chocolate caramel square. These cookies are deliciously chocolate and get a nice crunch from the addition of cornflakes, which is also something that seems to be used often in cookies made in New Zealand.  Of course, the Australians will probably say that these biscuits were invented there, just like they do for pavlova, and it’s true that I can’t prove it either way, since the Afghan cookies have been around for at least a Century, if not longer.  So, I will just declare that they are a slice of Kiwi goodness and hope that no Australian comes after me to fight about it.

What to do when you make Afghan cookies with kids

The cookies are very easy to make, and lots of fun as a kid project when they want to do some baking. If you do make them with kids, just be prepared to face the fact that there may not be enough icing to glaze the biscuits at the end since it may disappear by the spoonful into someone’s mouth instead of going on top of the afghans. The walnuts help to cut the sweetness of the cookies, but if you aren’t a fan of walnuts, go ahead and stick some pecan nuts on the top (but don’t tell any New Zealander you know that you did that).

Travel Photo Of The Week

This photo comes from one of my favourite places in Northland, New Zealand.  Actually I have many favourite places there, but this is way up on the list!  This is looking to the West of the cape toward Cape Maria Van Diemen.  I haven’t yet been down onto the beach. Somehow, there’s never enough time when I’m up at The Cape, but one day I vow to go for a walk along that deserted piece of sand. Cape Reinga is a marvelous place where you can really see the line made by the Pacific Ocean and the Tasman Sea crashing together.  It is seen in Maori lore as the jumping off spot for the spirits as they make their way back to their ancestral lands.

By Lisa Watson

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Chocolate Afghan cookies

Afghan cookies are a specialty from New Zealand and are one of those sweet treats that you find in just about every cafe you walk into there.  Make them at home with this recipe!

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine New Zealand

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 15 cookies

Ingredients

For The Cookies:

• 180 g Butter 6.4 oz
• 80 g Sugar 2.8 oz
• 60 g Cornflakes 2 oz
• 20 g Cocoa Powder 2 Tbsp
• 180 g All-purpose flour 6.4 oz

For The Glaze

• 20 g Butter 1 Tbsp
• 10 g Cocoa Powder 1 1/4 Tbsp
• 30 ml Boiling Water 2 Tbsp
• 250 g Icing Sugar (Powdered Sugar) 2 cups
• Walnut Halves for garnish

Instructions

To Make The Cookies:

• Heat the oven to 180°C (350°F ).
• Cream the butter and sugar together until it is white and fluffy.
• Sift the cocoa powder and flour together, then mix in to the creamed mixture.
• Crush the cornflakes slightly then carefully stir them into the mixture.
• Put tablespoonfuls of the cookie dough onto a cookie tray covered with baking paper.
• Bake for 18 - 20 minutes.
• Leave on the tray to cool for 10 minutes, then transfer to a cooling-rack.

To Glaze The Cookies:

Once the afghan cookies have cooled completely:

• Put the butter and cocoa into a small heatproof bowl.
• Add the boiling water and whisk until the butter has melted.
• Add the icing sugar and stir until you have a homogeneous mixture.
• Add dollops of icing on the tops of the cookies (about 1 Tbsp for each cookie).
• Place half a walnut on each cookie.
• Leave the cookie to set before storing in an airtight container.

What happens during Carnival in Europe?

It’s Carnival time in Europe right now! In France, that means that Nice on the Cote d’Azur has an enormous parade and a flower-throwing battle and the children get to dress up in costumes and throw confetti around (but more about that later).  In Italy, for Carnevale, people also get dressed up in costumes and have parties, but more importantly, there are many dishes eaten especially during this period.  After all, what kind of celebration would it be in Italy if there were no particular foods to be eaten while you’re partying? There are some savoury foods to be had, but many of the looked-forward to delights are deep-fried pastries, such as doughnuts in many forms, crunchy sweet treats dusted in icing sugar, and these crostoli, which are pastries stuffed with chocolate or jam and also deep-fried.

Eat Crostoli at any time of the year

You may be getting the idea now that there’s a frying theme going on during Carnevale, and you would be right. Carnival is all about having fun and eating decadently before moving into the Lent period and denying yourself some of your favourite things until Easter rolls around. I’m not terribly good about denying myself things like Crostoli, so I would eat them at any time of the year! I made these with Nutella in the center of them, but they are equally as good with any kind of jam in them.

A shameful confession

Now, here I should be inserting a photo of the one of the tremendous floats in the parade that happens every February in Nice on the Cote d’Azur. Much to my shame, I have to confess that I haven’t been to the landmark festival as of yet.  Well, I’ve only been here for 12 years.  It’s still early days yet…..right? The Carnival parade in Nice looks like something to rival the Thanksgiving parade in New York (which I haven’t been to either, but I’ve seen in every third movie set in New York), and at the end, they even have a huge fire to burn the king of the Carnival (don’t worry, it’s a statue, not a real person!).  I promise that I’ll try to go next year and then I’ll write about it.  If I don’t, you have to right to scold me.

During Carnival time, the schools in our area also have a party for the kids.  They all get dressed up in costumes, throw confetti all over the place and eat sweets.  For weeks afterwards, I find tiny bits of coloured paper falling out of the kids’ bags and clothes.

This post is part of our lovely monthly Cucina Conversations group.  This month we’re all focusing on recipes that are eaten over the Carnival period in Italy.

Rosemarie from Turin Mamma with Fagioli Grassi

Carmen from The Heirloom Chronicles with Baccala And Crispy Peppers

Flavia from Flavia’s Flavours with Frijole Veneziane

Francesca from Pancakes And Biscotti with Castagnole di Ricotta

Marialuisa from Marmellata e Cipolle with delicious meatballs

Daniela from Le Dani Gourmet with homemade doughnuts.

by Lisa Watson

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Nutella- Stuffed Crostoli

Crostoli di Nutella: Sweet Italian Carnival Pastries recipe. These treats are eaten before Lent during the Carnival period in Italy.

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 10 minutes minutes

Cook Time 3 minutes minutes

Resting time 1 hour hour

Total Time 1 hour hour 13 minutes minutes

Ingredients

• 450 g All-purpose flour
• 40 g Granulated white sugar
• 1 pinch Salt
• 40 g Butter at room temperature
• 2 Eggs
• Lemon Zest from 1 lemon
• 1 tsp Vanilla Essence
• 300 ml Water
• Light oil vegetable/sunflower
• Nutella
• Icing Sugar Powdered Sugar

Instructions

• Use a standing mixer. Mix the flour, sugar and salt together.
• Add the lemon zest, butter cut into small chunks and eggs.
• Turn the mixer on a low speed and add the water in a steady stream until the dough clumps together.
• Knead the dough for 5 minutes until it is elastic and smooth.
• Cover the bowl with a cloth and leave it to sit for at least one hour.
• Roll out the dough on a floured surface until it is about 1/4 cm thick.
• Cut the dough into rectangles, approximately 10 cm by 7 cm.
• Add 1/2 tsp of Nutella to one half of the rectangle, then fold the other half of the dough on top of it and close the opening  firmly around the edges.
• Add enough oil to a large pot to allow the crostoli to float.  Heat the oil and once hot, drop the crostoli in a few at a time.  Turn them over to allow them to brown on both sides.  The frying will only take a few minutes.
• Take the crostoli out of the oil with a slotted spoon and drain them on kitchen paper.
• Sprinkle the crostoli with icing sugar before serving.

The excitement of going to town when I was a kid

When I was a kid growing up on a farm in New Zealand, we used to get to visit “The Town” a handful of times a year.  It was always a very exciting trip.  We would get dressed in our best clothes, pile into the Holden Kingswood (affectionately called the Golden Holden), and drive down the windy gravel roads towards Town, an hour away. As we got closer, the road would lose the grass ribbon growing down the middle of it and become wide enough for two cars to pass each other. Eventually, we would feel a slight bump, and suddenly the crunching, rattling sound of the tyres rolling over gravel would stop and the ride would become as smooth as floating on a cloud.  We had arrived at the asphalt!  When we were in town, one of the thrills we looked forward to was riding up and down the escalator there. Who needs a theme park when you have a moving staircase! One of my other excitements was to eat lunch at a cafe.  I would cross my fingers and make all sorts of promises to whatever entity may have been listening, that I would be good for months and not ask for a second ride on the escalator if we could have a bought lunch rather than Mum packing a picnic and making us sit in a park and eat it. When my fervent wishes came true and we did get to go  to a lunch place, we had to abide by the “Two Things” rule.  No more than two foods on your plate, one of which had to be something savoury. I almost always got a mince pie and a yoyo biscuit.  It is true that sometimes, I would go nuts and get a custard slice instead of a yoyo biscuit, but those were dark days.  Every time,when it was too late, I would realize that the yoyo biscuit was what I really wanted after all. Call it a bitter learning experience and let’s leave it at that.

Yoyo biscuits bring back so many memories, just with one bite

It’s funny how when you grow up, these small things that brought you such pleasure when you were young, like my joy at eating a yoyo biscuit, can be completely forgotten about.  In fact, I only remembered about them this week after stumbling over a recipe for them when I was looking for something completely different.  I had a sudden nostalgia to eat one and so made them on the spot. Biting into one brought all the memories and emotions flooding back. It’s amazing how the taste and smell of certain things can do that to you. I felt the excitement I experienced as a kid from our town visits, and could almost smell the stale cigarette- and coffee-permeated cafe (it was before the days of smoking bans inside) as I bit into the cookie.

Yoyo biscuits are delicious, even in today’s world

These are delicious, even without the nostalgia factor, but look away immediately if you are on, or planning to be on, any kind of diet.  Yoyo biscuits are not for the  health-conscious among us.  They are loaded with butter everywhere you look.  That is one of the reasons they taste so good!  If that doesn’t scare you, then I really urge you to try them.  If it scares you just a little, make the cookies small so you get the taste, but still feel virtuous.  If it scares you a lot, you’ve probably left this page anyway and have gone to skim-read Facebook and scoff at what people have put up there.

Beware the cookie stealers!

Beware when you take these out of the oven that no family members wander by and steal one off the rack when you are not looking. You’ll then be left with an odd cookie with no partner. This is a serious kitchen crime which can result in banishment from the cooking area unless there are piles of dirty dishes to be washed.  Though, maybe one being stolen is a good thing as it means that you can smear it with filling and gobble it when nobody can see you. No one will even realize!

Below, I’ve included a photo of the filling so that you can see what sort of consistency it should have once it’s mixed properly.

Travel Photo Of The Week

This is a short of the perils you can meet when trying to drive to town in New Zealand. I used to gnash my teeth with impatience when I was young and we were heading for town.  It always takes so long to get through these guys!

By Lisa Watson

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Yoyo biscuits

how to make Yoyo Cookies from New Zealand. Find the perfect recipe for them on Italian Kiwi!

Course cookies, Dessert, sweet

Cuisine New Zealand

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 26 - 28 cookies before joining

Ingredients

For The Cookies:

• 175 g Butter
• 30 g Icing Sugar (Powdered Sugar) 1/4 cup
• 1/4 tsp Vanilla Essence
• 200 g All-purpose flour 1½ cups
• 40 g Custard Powder 1/4 cup

For The Filling:

• 50 g Butter at room temperature 3½ Tbsp
• 60 g Icing Sugar (Powdered Sugar) ½ cup
• 2½ Tbsp Custard Powder

Instructions

For The Cookies:

• Heat the oven to 180°C (350°F ).
• Cream the butter and sugar until fluffy.
• Add the vanilla essence and beat in.
• Sift the dry ingredients together. Mix them into the butter mixture.
• Form balls a little smaller than walnut size and place on a cookie tray lined with baking paper.
• Dip a fork in water and press the cookies flat.
• Bake for 15 - 18 minutes until hard to the touch.
• Allow to cool completely on a wire rack.

For The Filling:

• Beat the ingredients together in a bowl.
• Spread one cookie with the filling and join it to another cookie of a similar size.
• Allow the filling in the yoyo cookies to set a little before eating.

The joy of choosing tiny pastries

Baci di Dama are cookies that you find in pasticcerias all over the region of Piedmont in Northern Italy. We always choose to have a few when we go in to order a tray of pasticcini. I adore this Italian tradition of picking up a tray full of all sorts of tiny cookies and puffs filled with different flavoured creams whenever there is a special occasion!  I’m always very impressed by the people manning the pasticcini counters, as they have to be very patient with the customers.  The job for the customer of choosing which little cakes and cookies they want out of a selection of 20 to 30 different kinds is a very serious matter!

Tips for making Baci di Dama

In Turin, the Baci di Dama cookies can often be made to be nearly as small as your thumbnail. They’re easy to make at home, but rolling the dough into balls to make them that tiny is beyond my patience level, so I made the cookies about the size of a walnut. If you make them smaller, make sure you also reduce the time that they spend in the oven.

Which nuts to use to make Baci di Dama

The cookies can be made with hazelnuts or almonds.  They were originally made with hazelnuts, as hazelnuts are found in great abundance all over Piedmont.  That’s also why Nutella, which originates from the same area, uses hazelnuts. I used almonds as I’m very lazy.  You can buy ready-made almond meal in the supermarket here in France, so there was no need for me to buy the nuts and grind them up! They taste equally good, no matter which nuts you choose!  I made half the dough chocolate, and left half as it is, but that is also up to you.  You can make the baci di dama dough all chocolate, or leave it as it is.

The cookies are held together by melted chocolate.  I laid a pair of chopsticks on a tray and then balanced the joined cookies between them until the chocolate had set.  If you lie them on their sides when the chocolate is still soft, they will fall apart!

Travel Photo Of The Week

The photo below was taken in Turin last year at Christmas time (obviously!).  In the centre of Turin there are quite a few beautiful indoor arcades that you can walk through to get from one side of the block to the other.  We were strolling through one as we were on our way from having lunch in a lovely restaurant to having coffee at a great café when we stumbled on this fantastic Christmas tree.  The streets outdoors in the centre of Turin are lit up by different artists over the Christmas period as well.  It’s definitely worth getting out into the cold to see!

This post is part of the monthly link up for Cucina Conversations.  This month it’s all about edible presents that you can make to gift to friends and family.

Check out the ideas and traditional Christmas recipes below from:

Rosemarie of Turin Mamma with Croccante di Mandorle

Francesca of Pancakes And Biscotti with Canederli

Carmen of The Heirloom Chronicles with Cicerata

Marialuisa of Marmellata Di Cipolle with Ciciarata

Daniela of Le Dani Gourmet with Ricciarelli cookies

and Flavia of Flavia’s Flavours with Pizzelle.

Merry Christmas everyone!

By Lisa Watson

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Baci di Dama cookies from Piedmont, Italy

Baci di Dama From Piedmont, Italy can be easily made at home. Find the recipe here!

Course cookies, sweet

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Ingredients

• 150 g Ground Almonds 1 1/2 cups
• 150 g All-purpose flour 1 cup
• 150 g White Sugar 1 1/4 cups
• 2 Tbsp Cocoa Powder
• 150 g Butter at room temperature 2/3 cup, 5 1/4 oz
• 100 g Chocolate 2/3 cup, 4 oz

Instructions

• Heat the oven to 180°C /350°F.
• Mix all the dry ingredients, except the cocoa powder, together.  If you cannot find almond meal, grind up whole, peeled almonds in a blender until you have a fine mix and use those.
• Add the butter and work it into the dry ingredients using either a standing mix or your hands.
• Separate the dough into two roughly equals portions and add the cocoa powder to one of the balls. Knead it into the dough.
• Break off small pieces of the dough and roll it into balls.  Place them on a cookie-tray lined with baking paper.Push the balls down gently so that a flat bottom forms.
• Bake for 15 minutes, then leave to cool for at least 1 hour.
• Melt the chocolate over a very low heat. Spread some of the chocolate on the flat side of one cookie and stick it to another one about the same size. Put them gently on a tray covered in baking paper and leave them to set.