Kids Cooking Thursday: Sultana Spice Cookies

A variant on the $4 Biscuits we made last year, which didn't cost me anything, because I had all the ingredients either in the freezer or pantry. Nothing like knocking up a quick batch of biscuits to keep them quiet during the school holidays! As usual, if you don't have speculaas kruiden, you can substitute Dutch cinnamon, but do try your local international deli, because it makes a world of difference!

Sultana Spice Cookies
500g butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 can condensed milk
1 tsp vanilla essence
4 cups SR flour
1/2 cup cocoa
1 tsp speculaas kruiden (or cinnamon)
1 1/2 cup sultanas

Beat butter + sugar 'til creamy.
Beat in condensed milk.
Add in essence.
Mix in flour, spice and sultanas until all doughy and combined.
Shape into Tbsp sized balls
Bake for 12 mins @ 180°C. Cool on a wire rack.

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Kids Cooking Thursday: Experimental Lemon & Sultana Choc chip Cookies

Originally from AllRecipes, this recipe was tweaked completely out of shape. The end result was a bit crumbly, hence the cooling upside down on the rack, but although the biscuits themselves were fragile, the flavour was anything but!

Our edits were made from necessity, I didn't have any flour, but I'd already promised Miss Four we'd make biscuits. I used bread mix, which would have been fine, if I'd had the full two cups, and not 1 3/4 cups. The choc chips I threw in, because they were there, likewise with the extra sultanas. Maybe it was that my eggs were on the small side? At any rate, here is the recipe we actually made.

Lemon & Sultana Choc chip Cookies
1 3/4 cup wholemeal bread mix
250g butter, melted
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups white sugar
juice from one lemon
1 cup rolled oats
1 1/2 cup sultanas
1/2 cup choc chips

Squeeze the lemon

Stir together the sugar, egg, butter and lemon juice

Make sure everyone has a turn!

Add in the flour/bread mix. Stir until combined.

Add in the sultanas, oats and choc chips. Mix thoroughly.

Place on paper lined baking trays, lick spoon

When dropping batter from spoon, leave a generous gap between each biscuit

Cook for 15 minutes at 180°C. Cool on wire rack

If you'd like to join in with Kids Cooking Thursday please leave a permalink to your own Kids Cooking Thursday post, as per the rules.

Fruity Overnight Pancakes

Based on this recipe from Cookography, I made these pancake for breakfast to celebrate DP being home after a week in WA for work. His flight came in at ten to eleven pm Friday night, but by the time he drove home from the airport everyone was in bed asleep. I had these planned out so that even though the next morning was going to be a rush, with the last swimming lesson of term to get to, we could still have something special for breakfast.

Fruity Overnight Pancakes
2 1/4 cups wholemeal plain flour
3 Tbsp sugar
3/4 tsp salt
1 tsp speculaas kruiden (or ground cinnamon)
1 tsp dried yeast
1 tsp orange essence
1 1/2 cups warm milk
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 egg
3 Strawberry & Mango Fruit Infusion 'tea' bags
1 cup sultanas
boiling water to cover - about 2 cups?

The Night Before
Pour the boiling water into a small bowl, with the tea bags. Jiggle the tea bags to loosen the tea and start the steeping process. Pour the sultanas into the bowl carefully (don't splash yourself with boiling water!), using them to keep the tea bags under the water level. I actually did this on Thursday night, and took the tea bags out when I made my pancake batter on Friday. I put the sultanas and the tea in a covered Tupperware dish in the fridge to wait for Saturday morning. Leave overnight. In the morning, remove the tea bags, and drain off the tea - you can drink it if you like. Add the sultanas to the pancake batter and very, very gently stir through, being careful not to knock the air out of the batter.

For the pancakes:Place all the dry ingredients into the bowl and stir together. Add the wet ingredients and stir until well blended.

Store covered overnight in the fridge.

Spray a frying pan with cooking spray, and heat over medium high heat. Pour about 1/4 cup of batter into the frying pan for each pancake.

Brown on both sides and serve hot with syrup, or strawberry ice cream (if you are the sort of house that allows ice cream for breakfast!)