Coconut Butter Cookies

Lately, I have been reading articles on coconut, in particular, coconut milk, coconut cream and even their complementary products like coconut cream powder. And then I was thinking, hey, is this a new superfood as they called it? I realised that it is true.

 

Honestly, I have my misgivings about coconut since from young, I was taught that we can eat food with coconut but not too much because of the cholestrol 'benefits' it would give us. So when I read those articles, I was shocked and keep going like NOooooo no way....but as I read more and learn more about coconut, I realised that it is not as what we think.

 

I think the most common reason I understand about people avoiding coconut like plague would be because of its high saturated fat content especially when it's used in curries, desserts and cakes especially for those people who want to lose weight.

 

Oddly enough, do you know that coconut cream contains good saturated fat that improves your health and encourages weight loss as your body easily converts it to energy the moment it is absorbed? This is similar to how your body reacts when it absorbs carbohydrates.

 

Literally, that also means despite what you believe about the saturated fat that exists in coconut cream, it does not increases your bad cholestrol level that clogs up your arteries and triggers heart attacks and causes stroke. The most important thing is, it doesn't causes you to gain weight as easily as what you perceived it to be.

 

In fact, researchers and scientists have found the lauric acid content in breast milk to be present in coconut cream as well. Did you know that this content aids you in fighting viruses, bacteria, promote normal  brain development and contributes to healthy bones as well as the fact that it also has anti-carcinogenic and anti-pathogenic properties that keep cancer far away? Having said all the above, would you still believe that coconut is bad for you?

But please don't start indulging yourself in coconut cream daily. This should be the same for all health food. When you eat too much of a health food, you will still be piling on extra calories and gain weight as a result. So hence, it is better to eat wisely by consuming everything in moderation in order to reap health benefits without getting its disadvantages.

 

Enough talk about coconut cream. I think you should be quite ready to check out this easy peasy cookie recipe that uses coconut cream powder :)

 

The recipe is from 孟老師的100道手工餅乾 and it was through Wen's Delight that I saw it. See my modifications or comments in blue.

 

Ingredients:

75g unsalted butter (softened) I used Golden Churn, you may use a butter that has very strong buttery fragrance like SCS butter.
50g icing sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla essence100g top flour I used cake flour
10g cornflour
20g coconut cream powder You can find this in big, flat sachets in the local supermarkets. I used the Kara brand.

 

Method:

 

Method:

1. Preheat oven at 160 degrees celsius.
2. Sieve top cake flour, corn flour and coconut cream powder together and set aside.
3. Use an electric handheld mixer to beat the softened butter, icing sugar and vanilla essence till light and creamy.
4. Add in sifted flour into (2), use a spatula to fold in the flour and mix into a soft dough. It doesn't matter if you add the sifted flours to (2) or you add (2) to sifted flours.
5. Wrap the dough with cling wrap and chill for 30mins. I blast freeze the dough in the freezer for about 10 minutes and it worked.
6. Weigh and shape the dough into 12g balls.
7. Bake in preheated oven for 25 mins 14 minutes (this works for my oven but please use the usual baking time for cookies for your oven), turn off heat and leave the cookies in the oven for another 10 mins.
8. Remove from oven to cool it on a rack.

You wouldn't believe how my kitchen and literally whole house was scented with the perfume of the coconut cream powder. It's wonderful considering the fact that I've only used 20g of the powder. I think the next time I bake this, I would shorten the baking time by not leaving it in the oven for another 10 minutes. Nevertheless, the cookies are pretty fragrant and have a slight buttery taste. I would definitely use SCS butter next time I bake this for more buttery taste :)

 

 

 I'm submitting this post to Cook-Your-Books #11 organized by Joyce of baking flavours.

 

 

I'm also submitting this post to The Biscuit Barrel organized by Laura of I'd much rather baked than...