Valentine Cookies

2/15/2024

Ingredients:
Biscuits
100g ground almonds
125g Caster Sugar
300g Plain flour
200g Butter
1 medium egg
1 medium egg yolk
Baking tray, greaseproof paper/parchment, cookie cutters of choice - one large, others smaller to cut holes in the top section of the cookie.

Filling:
100g butter
100g icing sugar
dash of vanilla extract
Jam of choice

Method
1) grease a non stick baking tray and line with a baking sheet.
2) Mix the ground almonds and flour together.
3) Cream the sugar and the butter.
4) Whisk the eggs and beat very slowly into the sugar and butter mixture
5) Add the flour mixture gradually, beating as you go until you have a soft dough.
6) Divide in 4 patties and store in the fridge for 2 hours (or overnight)
7) Pre-heat oven 180 degrees, fan 160 degrees, gas mark 4
8) Take the dough from the fridge and let it rest for about 10 minutes. When it feels soft enough to roll out do so to a thickness of 2mm. Use your cutter to make the shapes you want and place on the baking tray. This mix doesn't spread so you don't have to leave a lot of space.
9) roll out the second batch and use the same cutter for the shape. Then cut out your centre hole with the smaller cutter.
10) Place on a baking tray.
11) cook for about ten minutes until golden.
12) Leave to cool and repeat process with the other two dough patties to make more cookies.
13) Make the buttercream by beating the butter and icing together. Spread this on the cooled cookie bases and add a blob of jam the size of the hole in the lid section.
14) Dust the lid with icing sugar if desired and then place on top of the filled base.

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A Wedding Breakfast
It was my pleasure to photograph a wedding breakfast created by Colline Watt, owner of Colline's Kitchen recently. With a bubbly and nurturing nature, it's no suprise to me that this mother from Zimbabwe wants to feed us all with delicious, fresh and sustainable food, along with a decadent cake or two, and how typical that, on the first date that weddings were permitted in the UK after lockdown, she got the call and I found her in a pretty garden with spectacular views piling food and flowers on to a table in a high wind, and creating an edible work of art.
Colline's successful cafe business, set in the historic Town Hall in the market town of Newbury has been put on hold since Lockdown in March, but she maintains a service, delivering food as diverse as Afternoon Tea and Mongolian beef stir fry, sourcing fresh ingredients locally. Find her at www.collineskitchen.com

BUNTING
When Jo, owner of The Bunting Basket asked me to photograph her bunting, I read her bio, and discovered how the business began, and how it came to be named The Bunting Basket. After making bunting for a family christening, Jo was innundated with requests for it from her friends and aqaintances, and she soon began to sell it at craft fairs, carrying her stock in a wicker basket. When I read this, I knew a picnic basket had to feature in my photographs. I looked at the fabric designs, and thought about the premise for the business and then began to prepare my shoot. Find her at www.thebuntingbasket.co.uk

Valentine Cookies

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