This is another cookie that has made it into the Christmas cookie list for me. The only down side to them is that this recipe makes about half as many as I want to eat! So I often double the recipe. Leah made this batch on Christmas Eve with me, we spent the day baking different kinds of cookies for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day consumption.

A soft cookie with a swirl of ganache on the top, a treat to eat, slightly fiddly, but worth the extra effort.

Oh one more thing .. don’t be tempted to eat the cocoa and oil mixture that the recipe calls for. It looks delicious…. I mean really delicious .. but it isn’t. Leah could not help but lick the spoon she mixed it up with, even after I told her that it would not be good. She then spent about a minute drinking water straight from the tap alternating with bleh, bleh, bleh, sounds - told you so!

Chocolate Almond Thumbprints

• 2 Tblspns Olive oil
• 3 Tblspns Dutch process cocoa powder (ordinary will be fine too)
• 125/4.4 oz grams of butter - softened
• 1/2 cup of caster sugar
• 1 egg separated
• 1 cup plain flour
• 1/2 cup of almonds finely ground in a food processor
• 100/3 1/2 oz grams dark chocolate roughly chopped
• 3 Tblspns liquid cream

Heat the oven to 180C/350F and line a baking tray with baking parchment

Combine oil and cocoa in a small bowl and mix until smooth - do not taste

In a large bowl beat butter and sugar until creamy - then beat in the egg yolk and the cocoa and oil mixture.

Stir in the flour

Make up a small assembly line with a lightly beaten egg white in one bowl, ground almonds in the next bowl and the baking tray last in line.

Take a teaspoon of the dough - roll into a ball - dip in the egg white, roll in the almonds and place on the tray.

Press your thumb or the end of a wooden spoon into each one. They should look like this.

Make the thumbprints deepish, because the centre of the cookie will still rise.

Bake for 10-12 minutes until they are just set. They are not a crisp cookie they are soft. If when you take them out the thumbprint is gone, just push down in the centre of the warm cookie to re-make the print.

Cool on a rack.

When the cookies are cool, melt the chocolate with the cream in a bowl over hot water to make the ganache, carefully spoon a little dollop into the middle of each cookie.

This recipe makes roughly 20 cookies.

Here is my earnest advice. Set aside the nicest looking one just for yourself - eat it while the ganache is warm, and tell everyone that you only got 19 from the recipe.

This cookie below - was cookie number 20. Poor little guy never made it out of the kitchen.

Roughly seven years ago I bought some aniseed, and then had no idea what to make with it. So I searched around online and found this recipe for these little Christmas cookies. I have made them every Christmas since then. I love the spicy aniseed taste combined with the ever so slight lemon flavour.

Over the years I have adjusted the recipe, since I felt initially the dough was too soft and sticky to roll out well, and I like a stronger aniseed flavour than the original recipe suggested.

Having done a little more reading since then, I know that the recipe for these cookies is not strictly speaking - authentic. The originals are made with lard (these are made with butter) and they normally do not have lemon, but either a sweet wine or sherry in them. However this slightly altered version is still completely worth making. They are the official state cookie of New Mexico, and are often served at celebrations, particularly Christmas.

This recipe makes quite a large number, so often I’ll make up the whole quantity of dough and then just bake half of it, and freeze the other half to make up later. It makes roughly 55 cookies.

Lemon Bizcochitos

• 3 cups of flour
• 1 tspn baking powder
• 11/2 cups of sugar
• 200 grams/8 oz of butter
• 2 large eggs
• 2 tspns of lemon juice
• 2 tspns aniseed crushed
• 1 tspn finely grated lemon zest
• cinnamon and sugar for sprinkling on top

Sift the flour and baking powder into a bowl set aside

Beat 1 1/2 cups of sugar and the butter together in another bowl until pale and creamy.

Add eggs, lemon juice, aniseed and lemon peel and mix. Add in the dry ingredients.

Place in plastic wrap and flatten into a disc and chill until firm enough to roll out. This will be roughly 2 hours or so.

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F and prepare a baking tray with parchment.

Roll out the dough to 3-4 mm/1/8th of an inch thick and cut into shapes with a cutter, place on the tray with a little room to spread and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.

Bake for roughly 12 minutes until just starting to turn golden on the edges.

Cool on a rack and store in an airtight container. These little cookies keep well and stay crisp for a long time.

These lovely little cookies have become a Christmas tradition in our house, but I do make them at times other than Christmas, because they are just too good to be eaten only once a year.

I can just see all you lovely American people sitting there thinking ” what on earth is  Hokey Pokey?” Hokey Pokey is also called honeycomb candy in the US. These little cookies have the same flavour. Hokey Pokey is also an icecream flavour here in NZ. One of my favourites in fact. In the UK, Crunchie Bars and Violet Crumble have the same flavour as these cookies.They are not the most fancy pants cookie out there, but there is something very more-ish about them, they are very crisp and have a warm flavour.

These were always one of my favourites as a child growing up. I could smell them cooking and I knew I would find one of them tucked into my lunch box the next day. This is the first time I’ve made these for a very long time. I was flicking through my trusty Edmonds Cookbook and spotted the recipe for them. The Edmonds Cookbook is almost a standard addition to the cookbook collection in every home in NZ. It was first published in 1908, so it’s over 100 years old! Recipes have been updated, removed and added during that time. But the old favourites remain. This is one of them.

Hokey Pokey Cookies

• 125 grams of butter
• 1/2 cup of sugar
• 1 Tblspn of golden syrup
• 1 Tblspn of milk
• 1 1/2 cups of plain flour
• 1 tspn of baking soda

Combine the butter, golden syrup, sugar and milk in a saucepan. Melt all of them together until they are almost boiling. Stir the whole time. Be careful here with the heat, or the mixture will stick to the pan.

Remove from the heat and let it cool a little.

Add in the sifted flour and baking soda and stir well to make the cookie dough. Roll into walnut sized balls, place on baking parchment and flatten with the bottom of a glass.

Bake at 180C/350F for roughly 15 minutes. My oven takes a little less than this. Anything with golden syrup will burn quickly, so keep a little eye on the cookies, and when they are an even golden brown in colour remove from the oven.

Cool on a rack. Makes roughly 2 dozen.

Great to pop into a lunch box or have with a hot drink.

Forgotten cookies, a strange name for a little light cookie which is hardly forgettable. These are one of my favourite things to make. I suspect the reason they are called forgotten cookies is that you place them in the oven overnight, and forget about them while you sleep. When you wake up in the morning to open your oven, you find these delicious little morsels. Pristine white, with specks of chocolate peeking through.

The variations you can have with these lovely little cookies is only limited by your imagination.

For this batch I used Green and Blacks Organic Maya Gold (I try to buy fair trade chocolate) teamed up with small curls of Tangelo zest. Maya Gold is Orange and spice flavoured it’s just perfect with the dark chocolate.

Another favourite is coffee flavoured with mocha chocolate. Nuts are another nice addition to these little creations. Toasted silvered almonds or finely chopped Pistachios.

They are always an unexpected mouthful. People expect just a plain meringue - but are always surprised with the little dollops of chocolate.

Forgotten Cookies

• 2 egg whites, at room temperature
• pinch of salt
• 1/2 cup of caster sugar
• 1 tspn vanilla
• 3/4 of a cup of Dark chocolate - orange flavoured chopped into small chunks
• 1 Tblspn of citrus zest (fine)

Preheat the oven to 180C (350F). Beat the egg whites until stiff and gradually add in your sugar one tablespoon at a time until you have a glossy meringue. Fold in your vanilla, citrus zest and chocolate. I have to mention that I love the sound the chocolate and meringue make when you fold in the chocolate - listen for it…

Place on a baking tray which has a sheet of parchment paper on it, drop in teaspoonfuls - these do not need a huge amount of room to expand, you should get them all on two trays.

Turn the oven off

Leave overnight in the oven - they will be cooked by morning. Or alternatively for at least 4 hours. Store in airtight containers

These are wonderful just on their own, dipped into mascarpone, or sandwiched together with cream. They make a nice gift in pretty cellophane.

I want to tell you about the little green bowl (circa 1930) that is in the picture. I was poking about in a local antique shop and I spotted this little jelly mould in a shelf with a lot of other green glassware. It was kind of chunky and had little imperfections in the glass, but they all added to it’s character. It was labelled “Depression Glass” I thought it would be perfect for the cookies that I wanted to show you all.

The very helpful woman behind the counter said - “You know this has uranium in it right?” Well .. no I was not aware that crockery had uranium in it - ever! But apparently this lovely green glass has roughly 2% Uranium in it. It’s also known as Vaseline glass. If you put it under a UV light it will glow eerily, perfect for your next Halloween party!

A lot of depression glass was given away free with various grocery items and coupons could be traded in for pieces. It comes in a variety of colours. I love this little green dish, and I have a feeling I am going to be adding to my Depression Glass collection - plus it’s especially awesome to be able to say to people ” You know that has Uranium in it, right?” and then watch the expression on their face, much like the woman in the shop did to me.

I can’t take the credit for the golden tower of Anzac biscuits below, but they were made in my kitchen, if that counts? Leah, my oldest daughter whipped up this batch for the lunches this week.

The recipe for Anzac Biscuits is one that Australians and New Zealanders argue over, both claiming its invention, and people have a definite preference for either the slender and crunchy version or thick, soft and chewy.

The story goes that during WWI, the mothers and wives of the soldiers were concerned that their lads were not getting the nutrition they needed, and a group of women came up with a recipe based around rolled oats. Eggs were scarce since many of the poultry farmers were off at war and the biscuits would not store as well with them included, so they were omitted from the recipe. Originally called Soldiers Biscuits, they were renamed Anzac Biscuits after the landing at Gallipoli.

These are a great cookie to have in the cupboard, they keep well and they are wonderful with a cup of tea or coffee. They are still made today and a firm household favourite in New Zealand and Australia.

I have several recipes for Anzac biscuits, this one below is my current favourite, and comes from The Great New Zealand Baking Book - by Allyson Gofton

Anzac Biscuits

• 1 cup of flour
• pinch of salt
• 1 cup of sugar
• 1 cup of rolled oats
• 125 grams butter
• 1 Tblspn golden syrup
• 1 tspn vanilla extract
• 1 tspn baking soda
• 2 Tblspn boiling water

Sift the flour and salt together into a large bowl. Stir in the sugar and the rolled oats

Melt the butter, golden syrup and vanilla together. Dissolve the baking soda in the boiling water and mix into the flour with the melted butter, mixing until they are all combined.

Roll spoons of the mixture into balls and place on a baking sheet

Bake at 180C for about 10-12 minutes until the biscuits have flattened and become a reddish brown - they can burn quite quickly, so keep a close eye on them.

Transfer to a cooling rack, the biscuits will crisp as they cool.