Eggless Almond Cardamom Cookies Recipe

Here's a riddle: I am sleepy but can't sleep. Once I manage to sleep, I can't bring myself to get up. What is happening to you if this is how you feel?

While you think about that, here's a super delicious, ridiculously simple and eggless cookie recipe. The cardamom lends an amazing flavour and the family I baked this for loved it! Might good choice by the Sweet Punch team this month I should say.

Eggless Almond Cardamom Cookies Recipe
Makes 30 medium-sized cookies
Adapted from: Manjula's Kitchen

Ingredients:
1.5 cups whole wheat flour / atta
3/4 cup sugar (powder coarsely if using regular white sugar)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sliced almonds
3/4 tsp green cardamom seed coarsely powdered
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
About 2-3 tablespoons of milk (only if you need it)

How I Made It:

1. Pre-heat oven to 360F / 180C

2. In a bowl, mix the flour, sugar, salt, sliced almonds and cardamom powder well.

3. Next add soft butter (and milk if needed) to the flour mixture to make dough. Dough should be very soft.

4. Divide the dough into about 32 equal parts and make them into balls. Press each ball between your palms lightly; every piece should be about 1/2” in thickness. Place the dough balls on an ungreased cookie sheet or parchment paper about an inch apart.

5. Bake the cookies for about 18 minutes or until cookies are lightly gold brown. After they become lightly golden brown remove the cookie sheet from the oven. Let the cookies cool down for two to three minutes before taking them off the cookie sheet.

Notes:

- make sure that the butter is completely soft and at room temperature, otherwise you will get crumbly dough when you mix and end up adding more milk than necessary, which will make the baked cookies more crackly and hard.

- I made 1.5 times the original recipe and got only 30 medium-sized cookies, as opposed to 36 - the number mentioned in Manjula's post.

- You can lessen the amount of sugar a bit if you'd like, they will still turn out sweet enough I feel. That will make them perfect with coffee/tea.

The flavour of the cardamom is amazing so don't hold back on them

These are absolutely delicious and the flavour of cardamom makes it extra special. Do yourself a favour and bake thee asap!

Condensed Milk 'Cupcake' Recipe

I think I should call these condensed milk 'chews' because they were quite chewy and don't really follow a cupcake recipe. I was wanting to make Mom's Delight but ended up mixing up the ingredients and baking them in muffin cups. The result was delightful.

I love desserts made with condensed milk or marie biscuits. The combination definitely makes it better! A quick evening snack for kids if you have all the ingredients in hand.

Condensed Milk Cupcakes or Chews

Makes about 10

What I Used:

Powdered Marie biscuits - 2 cups (you can also use digestive biscuits)

Sweetened condensed milk - 3/4 to 1 cup, depending on how sweet you sweet tooth is

Butter - 1 tbsp

Cocoa powder - 3 tbsp

Coarsely powdered almonds - 1/4 cup (use any dry nuts you have in hand or a mix of them)

Grated coconut - 2 tbsp

Milk - as required

A pinch of salt

How I Made It:

1. Mix butter into the powdered marie biscuits with your fingertips. You will get a crumb-like mixture. To this, add the powdered almonds, coconut, salt and cocoa powder and mix well.

2. Add condensed milk slowly to the above. Mix well using fingers until well incorporated. Don't worry if its sticky, its supposed to be.

3. If the above mixture is a bit too dry, add 1 or 2 tbsp of milk to loosen it up just a bit. The mixture shouldn't be too lose, just of scooping consistency.

4. Grease muffin cups generously and add one spoonful of the mixture to each. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 180C for 20 mins.

Enjoy warm!

By the way, winner of Rujuta Diwekar's book has been announced here. Congrats winner! :)