Nankhatai - Delicious Eggless Indian Shortbread Cookies

A very Happy New Year to all my blog readers. I hope you had  great first of January and are charged up to start the new year with good food. I thought what was better than to start the new year with a recipe of delicious Indian shortbread cookies, called Nankhatai. These are rather rustic and delicious and moreover eggless and extremely easy to prepare.

These heavenly cookies are rather hard to find. When I was growing up, one could never find them in regular grocery stores. These had to be bought from bakeries (which used to filled with the divine aroma of cookies and cakes). And then there were some door to door vendors who used to cart them in a big tin box on a bicycle and sell them. Of course, the easiest way to access them was when Mom baked them at home, but that not very frequent. And now, I find it is even more difficult to find these. So, when I really want to eat some, I need to order them online from Indian bakeries in other states. I finally decided to make them at home. My husband was quite insistent that these be the original, rustic cookies/biscuits without any nuts or additions and so, I kept it very simple. These turned out absolutely great.  The best part was that my toddler daughter was also involved throughout the making of this recipe and she thoroughly enjoyed it and then ate the cookies with relish.

Ingredients
1 cup maida/ all purpose flour
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/8 tsp cardamom powder
1/8 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking powder

 Method
Sieve together the all purpose flour, salt, cardamom powder and baking powder and keep aside. Whip the butter till it is fluffy. Then add the powdered sugar to it and blend it well together. Then add the all purpose flour mixture, a little at a time till it is completely incorporated into the butter. At this stage, the mixture will come together in a dough like consistency. Knead it to form a smooth dough and then cover it with plastic wrap and keep aside for about 20-30 minutes. Then make small balls of dough, about 1.5-2 inches in diameter. Keep these on a cookie or baking sheet lined with parchment paper or grease the sheet with a little oil. Keep at least an inch between the dough balls, so that there is enough space for the cookies to spread out as they bake.

Preheat the oven to 300F. Bake these for about 20-25 minutes, till lightly browned. Let them cool on a cooling rack. Store in an airtight box.

Tips
You can substitute whole wheat flour (either pastry or the ones used to make rotis) for the all purpose flour. Keep the butter out of the fridge at room temperature for about an hour before you start baking, so that the butter and sugar whip well together. If you use salted butter, then skip the salt. Use powdered sugar, not icing sugar. You can blend regular sugar in the mixer and powder it very fine.

French Butter Cookies - Sables

As December comes around, you can find stacks of butter cookie tins everywhere. They are probably available year round, but you just can't miss the huge stacks of tins during the holiday season. They are so delicious that I do cave into temptation and end up buying a couple of boxes. The ones that I see stocked in the local store,  generally are called "Danish" cookies and over the years I have come to associate butter cookies with being Danish.  A few days ago, I was watching the cooking show "America's Test Kitchen" and they demonstrated a cookie recipe called "Sables". Now they kept calling it a a French cookie. Their cookie platter looked delicious on the show and reminded me of butter cookies. Of course, I made fervent notes and jotted down the detailed recipe with all the tips they provided. I couldn't wait to try out the recipe, so I prepared the cookie dough (rather late at night) and then baked them the following day. Oh the result!!! Absolutely delicious and decadent. It was just like the butter cookies that I indulge in during the holiday season. So, based on this experience, I must conclude that I love all butter cookies. I have also learnt that they taste delicious and similar, irrespective of what they are named and what country they come from.

Ingredients
10 tbsp unsalted butter
1/3 cup plus 1 tbsp sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 yolk of hard boiled egg
1 tsp vanilla essence
1.5 cups all purpose flour/maida
1 egg white
1 tsp water
2-3 tbsp sugar (garnish)

Method
Mash up the egg yolk so that it is soft and lump free. Using an electric mixer or whisk, beat together the butter, sugar, salt and yolk for a couple of minutes. Once the ingredients are mixedd together, add vanilla essence and mix. Then add the flour a little at a time and mix till the flour is completely incorporated into the mixture. At this stage, the mixture will have a soft dough like texture. Bring it all together and roll out the dough into two logs. These will be about six inches in length and about 1.75 (1 and 3/4) inches in diameter. Roll up these logs tightly in parchment or wax paper. Refrigerate these rolls in the fridge for at least an hour. Then take these well chilled logs and cut them into diskettes about 1/4 inch in thickness. Place these on a baking sheet. Don't crowd the cookies, leave about an half to an inch space around each cookie. Then, make an egg wash by mixing together egg white of one egg and water. Brush the top side of each cookie with this egg wash. Sprinkle a little sugar on top of each cookie. Bake the cookies at 350F for 10-15minutes.

Cool the cookies for 5 minutes on the baking sheets itself, then transfer these to the cooling rack. Enjoy with a cup of coffee or tea.

Tips
Process the egg yolk through a sieve using a spoon to mash it up and squeeze out of the sieve. This will ensure there are no big chunks or lumps. The butter should be room temperature, but still solid. You can freeze the dough once you roll it into a log and you can bake the cookies when you are ready to eat them. The egg wash helps the cookies get a shine and also helps the sugar stick to the cookie.