maple – A True Love of Mine

Sometimes I wish I lived in Canada. Mostly when I think about how much I love Maple Syrup. In fact, in my Canadian house I would have a big Maple tree in my backyard with a tap in it so that I could get Maple Syrup whenever I want. (Because we all know that in dreams, anything can happen.) Then I would have Maple Syrup with my pancakes for breakfast, Maple Syrup in muffins for lunch and maple glazed ham for dinner. Maple Syrup with Beaver Tails… mmmmmmm….

But, while I am not living in Canada, I have had to resort to bottled Maple Syrup and find interesting ways to incorporate it into my cooking. And while bottled Maple Syrup is so incredibly expensive, I am trying to find thrifty ways of including it! Enter: Maple Pecan Cookies.

I got the recipe from the wonderfully titled Eat Me! The Stupendous, Self-Raising World of Cupcakes and Bakes According to Cookies Girl when I was searching for some cookies that were not full of chocolate (like everything else I make!) The recipe was simple and straightforward, and they seemed like the perfect picnic food.

They were fuss free and turned out beautifully crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside. Aren’t they pretty all in a row?

And they tasted great with a glass of milk! Very More-ish!

So the recipe was easy, the product was tasty, everything went well… what is this ‘saddest sight in the world’ I hear you ask? Look on, my lovelies…

An empty bottle of Maple Syrup. All that sweet, mapley goodness… gone…

I might go away and cry now.

Then I will go to the store and buy another bottle so I can make these delicious cookies again!!!

So what ingredient, my lovelies, do you find upsetting when you run out of it? Or am I the only one with such extreme reactions… maybe don’t answer that!

Maple Pecan Cookies – From Eat Me! by Cookie Girl

Ingredients

100g unsalted butter

255g caster sugar (I used golden caster sugar and it was pretty damn good!)

85g dark brown sugar

1 egg

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

285g plain flour

1 tsp bi-carb soda

3 tbsp Maple Syrup

55g chopped pecans

Method

1. Beat butter and sugars together until light and fluffy

2. Add the egg and vanilla

3. Sift over the flour and bi-carb and mix

4. Add the maple syrup and nuts, mix well

5. roll heaped tablespoons of mixture onto baking trays and cook at 150 degrees celsius for 8-10 mins or until lightly golden. Don’t bake for too long unless you like your cookies crispy

6. Enjoy on a beautiful picnic, or late at night with a glass of cold milk!

I have been very remiss with my blog this month. This year seems to be a very complicated year with each resolution being followed swiftly by a new problem that needs solving asap. This month has been a massive learning curve with mountains of marking, gale force winds, important birthdays and general stress! I think the most shocking lesson to learn was that somehow when I was sleeping words such as LOL, TTYL, TTYL and TTIF have entered the adolescent vernacular. I know that these are abbreviations, but apparently they can be pronounced as actual words. After spending five days in the wilderness with fifteen teenage girls, I feel well versed in the art of teenage conversation! So after being immersed in a culture that has changed dramatically since I was a part of it, I felt I needed to cook something buttery, sweet and slightly squidgy to make up for my general sense of confusion! Thank you Donna Hay for providing a beacon of light to guide and sooth me as I attempt to navigate the confouding morass of teenage popular culture.

Hail Donna Hay, creator of the

Cinnamon Sugar-Coated Maple Apple Cake

I had a bunch of pink lady apples that were on the verge of turning and were lightly too squishy to be eaten by themselves. This recipe made short but tasty work of them! The batter was very wet and sloppy but this made for light but moist cakes. Due to my extreme laziness the amount of butter in the recipe I didn’t even grease the pan and they mostly came out well. If you want the presentation to be perfect though, I would consider greasing the pan thoroughly or even using patty pans as I did have some breakages.

mmmmmm… cinnamony sugary appley goodness!

These are best eaten warm from the oven, so that a little puff of steam escapes when you break them open. You could serve these with cream or ice cream but in my opinion they stand alone and work well as a tasty snack. You can use any kind of muffin pan to cook them in, I cooked them in a large 6 hole texas muffin pan to begin with. Then I decided that Cinnamon Sugar-Coated Maple Apple Bars would be a good idea, so I made them in a mini loaf tin!

Yes, I didn’t grease the pan again. Yes, they broke. Badly. But on the upside, it meant that there were little crispy pieces of yummy buttery cake left in the pan for me to nibble on. And what could be wrong with that?

You could omit the final dousing in sugar and cinnamon and still have a delicious cake. But in my opinion, that would be like having a hot chocolate with skim milk. Why would you do that to yourself? If you’re going to eat a cake, it may as well be the tastiest cake you can lay your hands on. At least thats my argument and im sticking to it!

So, my lovelies, what is the strangest word you have heard recently being used in common conversation? Is it as strange as when one of my students told me that something was so funny that it was a “LOL-cano”? A volcano of LOL.

Cinnamon Sugar-Coated Maple Apple Cakes – From Donna Hays’ Seasons cookbook

Ingredients

2 1/2 (375g) self-raising flour, sifted

1 tsp ground cinnamon

250g butter

1 cup (175g) brown sugar

1/2 cup (125ml) maple syrup

4 eggs

6 red apples, peeled and grated (I had 7 or 8 but they were quite small, I dont think it really matters how many apples you use it will just be more or less appley according to the amount)

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 cup (220g) caster sugar

Method

1. Place the flour and cinnamon in a bowl and mix to combine

2. add the butter, brown sugar, maple syrup, eggs and apple and mix well to combine

3. spoon into twelve well greased 1 cup capacity tins (Donna Hay uses bundt tins but you could do anything) and bake for 20 mins at 180 degrees celsius. If you are using a different type of tin keep checking your cakes as they might take more or less time

4. Turn out of the tins immediately and coat the cakes in extra cinnamon and sugar

5. let cool for a little bit but eat while still warm!