In a large saucepan, melt the butter over low heat. Add the marshmallows and stir continuously until completely smooth. Remove from heat
Stir in the Rice Krispies cereal until completely coated
Turn the mixture out onto a large sheet of parchment paper or wax paper. Using a greased spatula, shape it into a large rectangle, keeping it about an inch deep all over
Grease a 3-inch heart shaped cookie cutter and cut out the hearts. Once you’ve made the first round of cuts, reshape the remaining marshamallow mixture into another smaller square or rectangle and repeat until you’ve cut all the hearts
Let the hearts harden for about 15 minutes while you melt the chocolate in a double boiler or microwave safe bowl
Dip the treats into the chocolate, or drizzle the chocolate, and add sprinkles. Harden in the fridge for about 10 minutes or just until the chocolate is set
Note: Treats taste best the day they are made. However, you can make them up to three days ahead and they’ll taste pretty fresh.
1 box red velvet cake mix (plus ingredients listed on the box to prepare the cake)
8 oz package cream cheese, softened
2 Tablespoons butter, unsalted
12 oz milk, dark or white chocolate chips
Method
Prepare and bake the cake according to package instructions. Let cool completely before moving on to the next step.
Using a fork or your hands, break the cake into fine crumbs into a large bowl.
Add softened cream cheese and knead gently with your hands until cream cheese is fully incorporated. You can mix together with a wooden spoon, or spatula, but I find using your hands works best here
You can use your hands or a cookie scoop to roll into 42 cake balls (about 1 heaping tablespoon per ball) and place on a wax paper-lined baking sheet. Place in the fridge to chill while you prepare the chocolate
Heat chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl until completely melted, stirring to combine
Remove cake balls form the fridge and place one ball at a time into the melted chocolate. Using forks, evenly coat each ball with the chocolate. Use the forks to remove the truffle from the chocolate and before transferring it back to the baking sheet, slightly tap the fork against the side of the bowl to get rid of any excess chocolate. Place on the baking sheet and repeat with remaining chocolate balls.
Pour leftover melted chocolate into a small ziptop bag, cut off one corner and pipe melted chocolate in desired design on top
Return truffles to the fridge for 15 minutes or until truffles are set
1 box (400g) Ready-to-bake refrigerated pie crusts
½ cup cherry pie filling, or strawberry jam
Frosting
1 cup powdered sugar
2 Tbsp milk
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
Food Gel colouring, optional
Sprinkles, optional
Method
Preheat oven to 375°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper
On a parchment-lined or lightly floured work surface, unroll one sheet of pie crust. Cut the pie crust into 10 hearts using a 3-inch heart-shaped cookie cutter. Place the hearts on the prepared baking sheet
On the same work surface, unroll the other sheet of pie crust and cut it into 10 hearts using the same heart-shaped cookie cutter
Spread 1/2 teaspoon filling, or jam, in the centre of each heart that is on the baking sheet, leaving about 1/4-inch around the edge
Place another heart-shaped crust evenly on top of each jam-topped heart. Press the edges down with your fingers all around the heart and then use a fork to crimp and seal the edges
Bake for 15 minutes or until light brown around the edges
Meanwhile, make the frosting by combing the powdered sugar, milk and vanilla extract in a medium bowl. Stir until you have a spreadable consistency, adding a small amount of extra milk if required. The frosting can be left white, or coloured using gel colouring
Remove the pop tarts from the oven and let cool on a rack before finishing
Frost the centre of each pop tart with desired coloured frosting. Alternatively place the frosting in a piping bag, snip the end off and drizzle over the cooled pop tarts
In a large bowl combine the semi-sweet chocolate, milk chocolate and butter. Set aside until needed
In a pan combine the egg yolks, sugar, cocoa powder and salt, whisking to combine. Over a low heat add the cream and milk, whisking to combine and cook for 8-9 minutes, until thickened and smooth. Take care not to overheat the mixture
Remove the egg yolk mixture from the heat and pour over the chocolates/ butter, passing it through a strainer, or sieve, as you do. Let the combined mixture sit for 5 minutes
Once the chocolate has fully melted add the olive oil and vanilla extract, stirring to combine until smooth and glossy. Set aside
Divide the Amarena cherries between 4 small bowls, ramekins or glasses and portion each with some of the chocolate budino mixture (in the region of 1/2 cup each). Place in the refrigerator to set for at least 90 minutes
Towards the end of this time you can make the vanilla cream topping. In a small bowl combine the powdered gelatin and water, heat for a few seconds in a microwave to dissolve the gelatin and then set aside to cool to room temperature
While the gelatin mixture is cooling, combine the whipping cream, powdered sugar, vanilla extract in a bowl and whip to soft peak stage
Reduce whisking speed to slow and add in the cooled gelatin solution to the soft whipped cream, pouring in steady stream as you continue to whisk. Once all the gelatin solution has been added increase the speed and whisk until stiff peaks, taking care not to over beat
Pipe or spread the vanilla cream over the tops of your set chocolate, dust with cocoa powder, top with an Amarena cherry (optional). Serve and enjoy
Valentine’s Day. Love it or hate it, there’s no getting away from it- even here I’m afraid. BUT I am hoping to give you something a little bit different in the recipe department. Heart-shaped and pastel-pink hued? Yes. However that’s where the predictability ends- or at least I’m hoping you think so too.
These started inception as…well…I was hankering for something sweet in between grocery deliveries. I wish I could come up with a more romantic, Earth-shattering epiphany than that but alas, no. My recipe for shortbread has been tried, approved and is a breeze to rustle up in a hurry. The instantly seductive baking phrase comes to mind, ” Quick and with minimal ingredients“. So in an effort to kill two birds with one stone, I got to thinking of doing a Valentine’s Day recipe post on shortbread.
So how can I make it “Valentine-sy”? Heart-shaped chocolate chip cookies just didn’t cut it for me. and so the mental gears turned. I had recently stocked up the pantry of some baking ingredients. “Livin’ the lockdown” dream has me currently baking every couple days- can we say “Therapy Baking”? Anyway as part of a restock I had some crystalised (candied) ginger going spare. I have a love/ hate relationship with this ingredient. Whilst I absolutely LOVE it’s mellow, slow-burning, sweet heat (especially in combination with dark chocolate) and so that was at the front of my mind. Pink peppercorns was my initial selection for the next feature ingredient. My worry, however, was that it falls slightly into the territory of over-familiarity, bordering on a go-to spicy contributor to desserts. Sichuan peppercorns are ideal to fill this gap, lending their signature tongue-tingling sensation as an extra boon without the visual fanfare.
That, for me, was enough going on internally. I try to limit the flavors within a bake in order to stop them becoming a jumbled cacophony on the tongue. I was still thinking of how to finish the flavor experience that I had in mind. And of course- rose hits me! Now I don’t mean some random pensioner walking by whacks me with her Kate Spade tote- I mean Rose the flavor. Sure it can be a tricky ingredient to use but when handled properly it can really bring a decadent statement to a bake. And let’s face it (at the risk of being slightly predictable) what’s Valentine’s Day with roses in some form? I’ve combined it here with an understated addition of white chocolate to help compliment the heat from the spices baked into the shortbread, stopping it from sitting on your tongue too long and dominating your palette.
Finishing and decorating your baked shortbread cookie is entirely at your own discretion. Leave them plain and simple, or as I did add a few choice sprinkles and some edible glitter themed in the spirt of the amorous season. See? I can do pretty.
Whatever you choose to do, whether it’s make these and share them, or keep the all to yourself I hope you enjoy them.
Stay safe, and mask up.
*Updated to include Chocolate version as featured on Food Network Canada’s “Great Chocolate Showdown”.
Makes 16 heart cookies (I use a 2″ heart shape cutter), or 24 if cut into fingers
Ingredients
1 2/3 cups AP Flour
1/3 Semolina
2 Tablespoons Rice Flour (if you’re making a Chocolate shortbread version sub here with cocoa powder)
1 1/2 Tablespoons Cornstarch
1/2 cup and 2 tablespoons fine sugar, divided
1/2 tspn Kosher salt
1 cup/ 2 sticks salted butter, cold and cubed
1/2 cup crystalized (candied) ginger, chopped in to small pieces
2 tspn ground ginger
2 tspn Sichuan peppercorns, toasted and crushed/ ground
To decorate
3oz White chocolate, broken into pieces (use Dark chocolate for Chocolate shortbread version)
1 tspn coconut oil
1/2 tspn rosewater (omit for Chocolate shortbread version)
Candy sprinkles, dragees to suit
Method
Shortbread Cookies
Lightly grease and line a 9″ x 12″ traybake tin
In a large bowl combine the flour, semolina, rice flour, cornstarch, sugar, salt, round ginger and ground Sichuan peppercorns. Whisk together to further combine
Add in the cubed butter and rub together with your fingertips, or a pastry cutter, until the mixture is just beginning to bind together. Every so often do a quarter turn of the bowl to make sure you’re using all the dry mixture. You’ll want a texture somewhere between breadcrumbs and damp sand before you stop. Be wary of overworking the butter into the mixture – you want to avoid a dough that is feels slimey from the butter melting too much into the dry ingredients
Add in the chopped crystalized (candied) ginger and stir lightly to combine
Tip the crumb mixture into your prepared tin and press the dough so that it forms a solid layer. Level the surface with the back of a spoon or measuring cup, making sure the mixture is evenly spread and uniform.
Refrigerate for 30 mins minimum
Preheat your oven to 325°F
Remove the chilled dough from your fridge and using your cookie cutter mark 16 heart shapes by pushing the cutter roughly halfway into the dough. You don’t have to go the full way through to the bottom of the pan. If you’re not making heart-shaped cookies, you can use a knife or pizza cutter score the shortbread into 24 rectangular pieces (2 cuts by 7 cuts) taking care not to actually cut the full way through
Bake the dough for 30- 35 minutes or until a very pale golden brown, and deeper golden brown at the edges
Remove from the oven and using your heart-shaped cookie cutter, cut fully through the baked shortbread . The dough in the cutter should come away, giving you a heart-shaped cookie. On a wire cooling rack carefully push out the cookie. Repeat and leave to cool fully*
(If you’re not using a cookie cutter simply cut with a knife or pizza cutter at the score lines you previously made, cut the the bottom of the pan to complete the cut the full way through. Leave the full slab of shortbread to cool in the tin for 15 minutes. Carefully lift the fingers out of the tin with a palette knife or the parchment paper overhang and finish cooling on a wire rack)
To decorate
In a small bowl, set over a pan of simmering water, combine the white chocolate, coconut oil and rose water
Heat over a gentle simmer, stirring occasionally, until the chocolate is fully melted and all ingredients are combined
Turn off the heat and carefully remove the bowl
Dip the shortbread hearts or bars into the melted chocolate and set on a rack or tray lined with baking parchment or silpat mat. (If you find you’re chocolate is becoming stiff and hard to work with, place the bowl of chocolate back into the hot water pan and leave to re-melt to a more workable state
Whilst the chocolate is still setting finish decorating in your preferred way
Because of the oil in the chocolate, fully decorated cookies should be stored in an air-tight container in the fridge for up to a week. Separate layers of cookies using baking parchment. To serve remove the cookies about 15-20mind before serving – or just eat straight from the fridge!
Crumbs In My Beard 