Growing up, the week before Chinese New Year to me = fun baking season. This is the season when my family will bake CNY snacks and store them into containers so that we can serve our guests while they visit (the reality is most of the time, we eat them all). Essentially, CNY doesn't feel like CNY without baking.
This recipe yields the cutest cookies ever, which conveniently themes well with the Chinese Zodiac this year: the year of the Dog! A perfect snack that is not too heavy, and not too sweet (so that you will have room for other snacks). Keep in mind that this may be time-consuming as it requires a lot of attention-to-detail work. Remember to read through the important notes at the bottom of the page!
Adapted from here
Ingredients.
125 g unsalted butter, room temperature
40 g icing sugar (sifted)
125 g Potato Starch
80g plain flour
1 tsp vanilla extract (optional)
1 tbsp cocoa powder
a handful of black sesame/chocolate sprinkles
Directions.
Cookie Dough
In a mixing bowl, use an electric mixer to beat the room temperature butter with the sifted icing sugar until light and fluffy. Add in the vanilla extract and continue to beat until combined.
Sift in potato starch and plain flour. With a spatula, mix until a soft dough forms.
Leave the dough to chill in the refrigerator for about 10 minutes if the dough is too soft to handle.
Skip step 3 if your dough is ready to go (it will be manageable like the glutinous rice ball 汤圆dough, for refference) and proceed to divide the dough into two portion with a 1:3 ratio. Mix the cocoa powder into the smaller portion of the dough.
Assemble
To assemble you will need:
plain dough: make a small round one inch ball and flatten it for the face of the doggies
cocoa dough : flatten two tear-drop shaped dough for the ears and flatten one tiny ball for the nose
sesame seeds/ chocolate sprinkles: I use black sesame seeds for the eyes. To make life easier, moisten the end of the toothpick with water and pick up each sesame seed, place on the face of the doggie, right above the nose.
*alternatively, you can reverse the color, and use white /dark chocolate chip for the nose. Just be extra careful when you put them together as our dough might crack if it is not moist enough, every step has to be extra delicate.
Bake
Once done, bake in preheated oven at 150C / 300 F for about 20-25 minutes. Be careful not to over bake them! To check to see if it is done, the back part of the doggie cookies should be slightly golden brown. Leave it on the tray for about 5 minutes to cool to prevent breakage.
*Right before putting them into the oven.
Important Notes:
i. To prevent the cookies from breaking, insert a baking tray right above the tray of the cookies.
ii. spray some water on top of the cookies before baking if assembling them takes a long period of time (like me! I took two hours).
iii. You can moisten your hands with water and mix up the dough when you are assembling the cookies if you feel that your dough is getting too dry.
iv. Make sure all your little doggies are not too big as it is hard to cook them completely.
*Mine has some little cracks on it, as I don't spent too much time perfecting each dough. Oh wells.
Still, they are definately fun to make. Have fun making these cuties!
If you have got this far, give yourself a pat on the back! Happy CNY!！🐶
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