Sweet treats for work: Chocolate Buckwheat Cookies
Lacking my once-easy access to a variety of shops, providing me with a large assortment of ingredients to play with, these days I tend to concentrate on the products available in Urru and have also become a habitué of my local health food shops. After finding some cacao nibs in The Granary (Mallow) and picking up a bag of buckwheat flour from Horan’s Health Store in Fermoy, I decided to make a batch of Alice Medrich‘s Nibby Buckwheat Butter Cookies that had come to my attention through 101 Cookbooks.
I’ve written about Heidi, her site and her cookbook, Super Natural Cooking, here before. Both the blog and the book are things I keep turning to, again and again, for sweet and savoury inspiration, especially after I pick up something new from the health shop. With the addition of some dark chocolate chips – I wanted to balance the bitterness of the cacao nibs – these turned into Chocolate Buckwheat Cookies, rich and nutty from the buckwheat, crunchy with cacao nibs and sweetened by the chocolate. The flavour of the buckwheat is particularly pronounced on the day that you bake the cookies, mellowing nicely in the days that follow – making these great to fill the going-to-work tin.
I have a suspicion that these cookies will also be great sandwiched with vanilla ice cream, and I’ve a tub of Murphy’s awaiting attention in the freezer at this very moment. I didn’t get a score this week from the Polish Colleague but the Mallow Workmate said that they were her favourite of all the things I’ve brought to work so far (8/10).
Chocolate Buckwheat Cookies
Plain flour – 6oz
Buckwheat flour – 4oz
Butter – 8oz, at room temperature
Light Muscovado sugar – 6oz
Pinch of salt
Cacao nibs – 1oz
Good quality dark chocolate chips – 1oz, I used one containing 60% cocoa solids
Vanilla extract – 1½ teaspoon
Mix the plain and buckwheat flours together in a large bowl. In the bowl of a stand mixer – I used the paddle attachment on my KitchenAid – cream the butter, sugar and salt together for about a minute until well combined. Mix in the cacao nibs, chocolate chips and vanilla extract. Add the flours and beat on a low speed until just combined, using your hands to knead the mixture together if necessary to make a smooth dough.
Shape into a log, about 12 inches long and 2 inches in diameter, on baking paper. Wrap and put into the fridge for at least 2 hours or, to make it easier, overnight.
Preheat the oven to 350˚F (180˚C/170˚C for a fan oven) and cover two baking trays with sheets of baking paper. Slice the cookie log into pieces approximately ¼ inch thick, spacing them about 1½ inches apart on the baking paper. Bake in the preheated oven for 12-14 minutes, until the cookies start to brown around the edges. Check them half way thorough as you may have to switch the trays around. Cool the cookies on a wire rack and store in an airtight tin.
Makes about 48 cookies.
