Carrot Cookies (makes 12 cookies)
For the cookie dough:
225 g butter, cold, cut into cubes
Sugar 225 g
330 g flour
100 g carrot, finely grated or crushed
1 tsp (tea size) ground cinnamon
1 pinch of salt
1 pinch of cloves, cardamom and ginger (optional)
For the filling:
150 g of cream cheese, philadelphia type, room temperature
100 g of butter at room temperature
100g icing sugar
- Preheat oven to 356 º F. Mix all ingredients with your fingers, and knead to form a compact ball.
- Divide the dough into two parts, and stretch between two sheets of baking paper, using a roller, until the dough is about 0.5 cm thick. Cut the cookies with a pastry cutter, and place on a baking tray lined with baking paper.
- When they are all ready, place the cookies in the freezer for 15 minutes or the refrigerator a couple of hours, so the cookies retain shape better when baked.
- Remove from the freezer or fridge and bake about 10-15 minutes. Let cool on a rack. Prepare the filling, beating with a wire whisk all ingredients until it is white and fluffy.
- To fill the cookies, put a small amount of filling in the center of one cookie and place another cookie on top, press lightly. Stick the preprepared sugar or marzipan carrots to the cookie with a little icing . The carrots can also be prepared using a fondant and a mini carrot mold.
Valentine’s Day Loaf (makes 1 loaf)
3 cups bread flour
1/8 cup fresh bakers’ yeast
3/4 cup of milk
3.5 tablespons of melted butter, cold
1 teaspoon of salt
2 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon of beet cooking liquid
1/8-1/4 cups of additional bread flour
- Mix flour and yeast in a large bowl. Add milk and butter, then honey and salt, and integrate well. Mix with the help of a wooden spoon or a baker scraper
- Take out the dough from bowl and knead started. After 5 minutes, the mass will become more and more elastic. Bake another 5-10 minutes, until you get a soft dough, folding, and slightly brighter
- Divide the dough into 3 parts. Add beet liquid to one part to dye and knead well until the piece of dough is a uniform color. The extra liquid will make the dough somewhat sticky, so add a little more flour, just enough to comfortably work the dough (between 1/8 cups and 1/4 cups).
- Prepare the heart-shaped mold.Grease it well inside and out. This step is important because it will allow you to remove it easily later. Put the heart into the loaf pan (if you use a metal mold, grease will also be necessary).
- With pink mass, fill the heart. You can either use a piece of plastic to properly distribute the mass and fill all the recesses of the mold, or just use your fingers
- With the white mass, make four balls, and place them around the heart, again pressing down firmly, and distributing it to fill the entire mold. Leave the dough in a warm place for mild, between one and two hours. To weigh, put the pan with the hollow side up.
- Preheat oven to 356°F, and carefully withdraw the mold core inside the pan. Bake 30 minutes. Let cool for a few minutes, then cover with a cloth to cool completely, so that the crust is tender. It’s best to leave overnight before slicing.
Notes:
- If you don’t want to use beets, you can try with cocoa or strawberry powder, putting a little less flour in that case. You can also use pink food coloring.
- To keep it perfect, it’s best to cut it into slices and freeze, separating the slices with baking paper to prevent sticking so the bread remains fresh.
