Chocolate, orange and cranberry cookies

It's a new month and therefore a new We Should Cocoa Challenge. December is hosted by Choclette from Chocolate Log Blog and she chose orange as the ingredient for this month. Chocolate and orange is quite a classic pairing and a few ideas ran through my head - cupcakes, cakes, brownies, cookies.... I finally decided that I would create my own recipe in the form of a cookie. I absolutely love cookies, probably more than cake! My inspiration came from this lovely bag of Orange Nice Spice Puddles from Hotel Chocolat - they were part of the Christmas Collection Gift Bag that I won from a giveaway hosted by purelyfood - thank you so much! :)

So on to the cookies. Well it's a basic sugar cookie with the addition of orange zest, fresh orange juice, dried cranberries and the orange puddles. The result - a really lovely and festive cookie. You can clearly taste the individual flavours which complemented each other well. The cookie was light with a slight crunch and smelled amazing! I'm definitely making these again. You can substitute the chocolate puddles for chopped chocolate or chocolate chips - I'm thinking bits of Terry's Chocolate Orange next.

 adding the orange zest 

 I made sure every cookie had at least 1 chocolate puddle :)

I'm also submitting this to Vanessa's Let's Make Christmas Event as it would be a great Christmas gift

And finally to a cookie bloghop from mikesbaking #cookielove

An original recipe by bakingaddict

Makes 22 cookies of size shown

125g butter

75g sugar

1 egg

Zest of 1 orange

Juice of 1/2 orange

150g plain flour, sifted

110g chocolate puddles as shown here

50g dried cranberries 

• Preheat the oven to 180C.
• Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. 
• Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
• Add the egg and mix well.
• Add in the zest of 1 orange and juice of 1/2 an orange.
• Sift in the flour and mix well.
• Finally stir in the chocolate puddles and dried cranberries with a spatula. 
• Use a small ice cream scoop to place cookies on the baking tray spaced apart. 
• Bake for approximately 12-15 minutes until lightly brown around the edges.
• Allow to cool on the tray for a few minutes before transferring to a cooling rack to cool completely. 

Ninjabreadmen

This Christmas I present to you some 'Ginja Ninja's!' Everyone loves gingerbread (possibly with the exception of myself!) and this is a really fun twist to making gingerbread.  It's simple to bake and if you have kids, they can join in the fun too. 

I was sent these ninjabread cookie cutters by find-me-a-gift.co.uk to review. They are made of stainless steel and come in a set of three. There's a recipe for gingerbread on the back of the pack which I used to make these ninjas.  These are seriously cute cookie cutters and I'm sure I will be making lots of ninjas throughout the year.  Everyone has been impressed with the results and keep asking where they can buy these cookie cutters. Unfortunately the supplier has run out of stock currently but they should be getting more stock in so check back to find-me-a-gift.co.uk later. They would make excellent Christmas presents :)

*update: cookie cutters are now back in stock. Click here to buy some for yourself * 

The fun thing about making gingerbread ninjas (or men or women) is that you can be really creative with the decorating.  I'm afraid I'm not terribly creative and just went with the picture on the website and the pack. I might try my hand at royal icing next time.

As this is a Christmassy treat, I am entering this into the tea time treats challenge. This is a monthly event hosted on alternate months by Kate from What Kate Baked and Karen from Lavender and Lovage.  Kate, the host for this month has chosen Christmas as the theme.

I'm also entering it into Vanessa's Let's Make Christmas event. Do check out her blog if you haven't already for the ultimate guide to making your own edible Christmas gift.

And to Let's Cook for Christmas Red and Green, hosted by simply food

And to the holiday goodies link up over at Diary of a Semi-Health Nut hosted by Amanda

 the ninjas! 

 making ninja's

 ready to go in the oven 

 

 

 

 spot the odd one out :) 

Many thanks to find-me-a-gift.co.uk for providing me with the ninjabreadmen cookie cutters. 

Recipe from the back of the pack: Makes 24 ninja's and 1 gingerbreadman 

350g plain flour

2 teaspoons ground ginger (I used 3)

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

100g butter or margarine

175g soft light brown sugar

1 egg

4 tablespoons golden syrup (I used just over 5 as the dough was still crumbly)

• Preheat the oven to 190C.
• Line 2 baking trays with parchment paper. 
• Sift the flour, ginger and soda into a bowl.
• Rub in the butter with your fingertips. 
• Add the sugar then stir in the syrup and egg. 
• This should make a firm dough.
• Roll out onto a floured surface about 5mm thick and cut out your ninjabreadmen. 
• Place onto baking trays, spacing them apart as they will expand.
• Bake for 10 to 15 minutes until golden brown.
• Once cooked, leave to firm up for about 10 minutes before placing on to a wire rack to cool completely. 
• Decorate with coloured icing.