BLACK SESAME SHORTBREAD...a fusion of flavours!

"Come and share a pot of tea, My home is warm and my friendship's free."
Emilie Barnes

Black Sesame Shortbread Cookies...

You think you've kinda lost it when you start dreaming Black Sesame Shortbread! That's what has happened to me ever since I saw these wonderfully enticing cookies at Diva's Sugar Bar. Shortbread is my all time favourite sort of cookie, & sesame in a cookie is entirely intriguing.

'Cookies with a heart, from the heart'!...

So, after reading Diva's delicious post, pretended to pull on my boots. Further pretended that I was walking down to Sainsburys. In reality, pushed my feet into a pair of slip-ons & drove down to our local Sainsbury...Reliance Fresh, which in all fairness, is an answer to many prayers, including Black Sesame ones! The store can't be compared to Sainsbury, but has done well to offer much variety under 1 roof. Imagine my sheer shock when I nonchalantly checked out the spice shelf there & found black sesame seeds...thought I was still dreaming!! Have even found slivered pistachios there in the past,which is something unheard of here in India!

A fusion of flavours...shortbread which is so Scottish & black sesame which is so Asian!I'd call this a cookie across cultures......an intercultural cookie? Sesame seed is one of the first recorded seasonings. It grows widely in India and Asia. These tiny seeds come in shades of brown, red and black, but the most common color is a pale grayish-ivory. Sesame seeds have a nutty, sweet aroma. The black sesame seed is less common and has a more concentrated flavor than other sesame seeds. Black sesame seeds are especially good on salmon and other fish.

Black sesame appears frequently in Chinese, Japanese and Korean dishes where meat or fish is rolled in the seeds before cooking for a crunchy coating. Black sesame is an ingredient of gomassio, the Japanese tabletop condiment, and other colourful rice and noodle dishes.

The recipe from Diva's Sugar Bar (thank you Diva, these were great & very different too!)
Ingredients:
Flour - 2 cups
Salted butter - 225g / softened
Powdered sugar - 1/2 cup
Black sesame seeds - 3 tbs (generous) ; half ground (I did this in the pestle & mortar)
Vanilla extract - 1/2 tsp
Pinch of salt
Vanilla sugar, for sprinkling (Diva used castor sugar)

Method:

• Whisk together the dry ingredients.
• Beat the butter till just soft and creamy. Add the vanilla extract, beat.
• Now add all the dry ingredients and mix together.(I find it best to use your hands from here on and mesh all the butter and dry ingredients together, kind of like how you’d make scones but without the rubbing as you don’t want too much air in these guys...Diva's expert advice).
• Press everything together to form a dough ball and then gently form them into discs. Wrap each disc with clingwrap and fridge for 1hr, or until just firm. (Took a lot longer in our 40 degrees+ C...a hot Indian summer?)
• Preheat oven to 170 degrees Celsius and grease 2 cookie trays.
• Roll out flat to your desired thickness on a lightly floured work surface ; keep the thickness preferably just under 1cm. Cut out with cookie cutters.
• Place on greased tray and sprinkle with vanilla sugar.
• Bake for about 15min or just before the edges get too brown.
• Cool on wire rack. Eat them slightly warm with a steaming cup of tea!

Heave ho,heave ho...off to Ruth's we go!! Another successful bookmarked recipe I've managed to try! YAY!! This is off to Ruth's Kitchen Experiments for her Bookmarked event...