Polly's Thumbprint ALMOND COOKIES with Fresh Apricot

 I enjoy the Chinese Almond Cookies.  It's been a long long while since I've seen a pink box with dragon emblem printed on it being sold or bought one.  My father really love that snack. So did family members.  That one single almond atop of the crispy cookie is the highlight.  I personally did not tasted "almond' in the cookie itself and I eat them just to get to the almond on the top.  The almond can be easily picked off the top, but that's not really done, did we?  An almond cookie missing an almond atop of it is always left behind in the box, I noticed.  Regardless, I came up with my version of the almond cookies.

My family gave me a bag of apricot.  I ate some fresh.  I decided to bake with it too.

 

*Pick a rather small size apricots.  As the sliced apricot will be set on top of your cookie.

Wash and dry apricot.  Slice into halves.  Remove the pit.  Slice each halves into four.

1.  1-1/2 Cup shifted flour with 1 tsp Baking Powder, 2 Tbsp Ground Flaxseed Mills.

 

2.  Mix 3/4 stick softened butter in a bowl with spatula - about 10 times, then, mix in 1/3 C sugar.  Hand mix till pale.

 

3.  Add 2 tsp Cook's Pure Almond Extract (optional:  and 1 tsp pure Vanilla Extract ) to #2 above.

Mix #1 and #2 together well.

 

Preheat oven to 400'F

With 1 inch  cookie scoop, scoop onto lined baking sheet with silpat or unbleached parchment paper.

Thumbprint each dough deep enough to hold a 1/4 tsp drop of apricot preserve and a small piece of sliced fresh apricot.

Or you can make one without apricots and place a sliver of almond on top of it if you would like. 

Bake for 10 min or so.

Enjoy!

Homemade Organic Soy Bean Milk

Homemade organic soy bean milk is very simple to make.   All you need is a cup of Organic soybean milk.  Why organic?  I heard that soybean is one of the crop beside Corn that is heavily pesticided.   And I rarely eat restaurant's EDAMAME served as free appetizer because of it, unless it is organic, 

Wash 1 cup of organic soybean.  Hydrate soybean in clean water overnight or few hours.  The soybean should be doubled in size and its skin is easily removed when rubbed between fingers.

Drain a few times with filtered water.

 

Add into NutriBullet processor and with enough water.  Beat till you can visually see that beans are well blended into slur like. 1 to 2 min.  Put them through Sieve or beverage strainer pocket over a tall pot.   Depending on your preference, add 2 to 3 times more clean filtered water   Bring to boil.  Do not leave the kitchen - be careful - do not let it spill over.  Bring heat to simmer.  Place a lid loosely and cook for 15 minutes.  Serve hot - Add sugar or server savory.  Serve with Chinese Yeou Tiao - fried breakfast donuts sticks, Sao Bien (Shaobing) - baked flatbread covered wtih sesame seeds filled with braised meat and or with green onion, or serve chill as beverage. 

 

If you have Instant Mixer, that will be good, too.  Because it can process the soybean and Cook the soybean, then, you can strain the cooked soybean milk and enjoy.

As you help push the liquid through the strainer, the soybean paste remain.

This soybean paste can be used to make other dishes.

After extracting all liquid, if you have a fine sieve, pour the soy milk through to catch the rest of the fine soy or put the soy milk through a large cloth tea strainer if you have one.  Pour more clean water through to extract more soymilk. This process will filter out the rest of the fine soybean residues and make the soymilk more smoother.

You can serve sweet by adding sugar.  Some people would add a bit of soysauce or whatever they like.  Serve with typical Chinese breakfast items like fried Yeou Tiao or Sao Bien (Shaobing) - baked flatbread covered wtih sesame seeds (no picture here).

July 4th Celeb Fam Cooking

 Wow, We were all dazzled by Amy's cooking.

Beautiful INARIZUSHI

OKONOMI YAKI

OKONOMI YAKI - "as you like it" - shredded cabbage, flour, beaten eggs, bacon, topped with Katsuobushi (dry bonita shavings), Tonkatsu sauce or Okonomiyaki sauce, optional mayonnaise.

INARIZUSHI - each one is so intricately filled with rice, slice of KAMABOKO, Cucumber, Avocado, Egg Crepe, (imitation) Crab, Unagi, Tobiko.

Cooking OKONOMI YAKI

BBQ Prawns and Scallops

Teriyaki Beef Kebabs

Teriyaki Chicken

And there is MITARASHI DANGO with Ground FLAXSEED Mill to add to empty carb for health. And there is the ones with MATCHA or YOMOGI (Mugwort leaves).  Ingredients and cooking/preparation method is the same as previous post's.

The slight greyish green is the MATCHA, and the greenest ones is YOMOGI, tan white ones are the regular DANGO with specks from ground flaxseed mill.

MITARE prepare with KATAKURIKO always give the translucent shine.

The other one is Chinese ALMOND Jello - SHIN REN TOFU.  Making them with AGAR AGAR threads, Lactose free milk, Cook's Pure Almond Extract, Del Monte's Fruit Cocktails in Juice (drain most of the juice), home made simple syrup.

 

When the jello is formed, cut them into squares into the serving dish.  Add slightly drained fruit cocktails, add simple syrup, and serve cold.

 

Heat Milk and dissove AGAR AGAR threads.

The formula in the back of the package instructed dividing the package of 42.5 g/pkg, into two.  Bring 20 bowls of clean water in a pot to boil.  Add AGAR AGAR and stir to dissolve.   Add add 1-1/2 lb of sugar, and 1 can of milk, 1/4 tsp Almond extract.  Transfer to a dish, let cool, then, chill till firm.

 

I washed AGAR AGAR thread in a clean bowl of water till clear.  I used 5 bowls of clean water and 15 bowls of Lactose Free Low Fat Milk.  1+ Cup of sugar - Taste and add more as needed.  *Remember that simple syrup and fruit cocktak in juice would also add to the sweetness.   Carefully bring liquid to boil to avoid spill over.  Stir in the clean AGAR AGAR threads till dissolved.

Transfer to a large flat dish with large surface.  Let Cool, then, chill in refrigerator.

Make simple syrup and open a can or two Fruit Cocktail with Juice.  Chill.   Depending on your taste, you might want to drain some of the juice as the acidic taste might overcome the overall taste.  Add a teaspoon and half of Cook's Pure Almond Extract to the liquid.  

Slice into 1/2 inch squares.  Add chilled syrup and Serve.

 

A Can of Lychee is added to this one.