Port cookies to celebrate Leo

My days are still super busy, and I hope things slow down a little in the weeks to come, but I am still making super quick recipes at home (and there are days I don’t make anything at all) and I am also still writing very short posts, as you can see. :)

However, there is one thing I could not leave aside, which is the fact that my beloved Leonardo Di Caprio, or “Leozinho”, as I call him, has finally won an Oscar, after so many years watching less worthy actors take home the award (not to mention the wonderful performances that were not nominated). The Internet almost collapsed and I jumped on my bed (and there were people a lot less subtle than me). :)

So congrats to Leo! And because of that I am posting cookies – not any kind of cookies, but cookies made with wine, because it is time to celebrate. \0/

Port cookies
slightly adapted from Rita Lobo

2 cups (280g) all purpose flour
¼ cup (25g) almond meal
½ cup (100g) granulated sugar
pinch of salt
200g unsalted butter, chopped, room temperature
¼ cup (60ml) Port wine
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
icing sugar, for dusting the cookies

Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F. Line two large baking sheets with baking paper.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, place flour, almond meal, granulated sugar and salt and mix on low speed to combine. Add the butter and mix on low speed until a dough begins to form. Drizzle the wine and vanilla over the mixture, mix again on low just until a dough forms, but avoid overmixing.

Roll 1 leveled tablespoon of dough per cookie into balls and place onto prepared sheets 2.5cm (1in) apart. Gently flatten each ball. Bake for about 30 minutes or until lightly browned around the edges. Remove from the oven, transfer sheet to a wire rack and dust the hot cookies with the icing sugar. After 5 minutes, slide the paper with the cookies onto the rack and cool completely.

Cookies can be kept in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 1 week.

Makes about 42

Port cake and visual songs

Some of the songs I love, besides being great music, are very visual to me – I can picture the scenes as the lyrics go by a lot easier than other songs, it’s like having my very own private video clip inside my head. :)

While listening to “Am I Right?”,“Say Hello, Wave Goodbye” or “The Golden Path”, I can easily imagine all the actions while they’re singing because of all the details; I picture two gentleman having a conversation when Morten Harket sings the first verse of “Manhattan Skyline” – it’s impossible not to.

I could not however imagine what a cake with ½ cup of fortified wine in the batter would be like (in this cake the raisins got boozed up so heavily that there wasn’t much Marsala left to go in the batter), therefore the sherry cake recipe I saw on Delicious magazine got me really curious. I ended up baking it but used Port instead, and the result was a very unusually flavored cake – but not in a fussy way – and so tender it was hard to slice it.

Maybe not everyone’s cup of tea, but something worth trying at least once, especially if when it comes to cakes all you can picture in your head are the usual suspects like lemon, orange and apple ones. ;)

Port cake
slightly adapted from the always wonderful Delicious UK

225g all purpose flour
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt
125g unsalted butter, softened
125g granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
200ml Ruby Port wine
Icing sugar, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F. Butter a 20cm (8in) square pan, line the bottom with baking paper, butter the paper and dust everything with flour, taping out the excess.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
Using an electric mixer, beat together the butter and sugar until fluffy and pale. Beat in the eggs, one by one, then beat in vanilla. Using a rubber spatula, gently fold in half the dry ingredients. Add the wine and fold in along with the remaining dry ingredients (at this poing I wasn’t happy with the consistency of the batter and added 20g all purpose flour).
Pour everything into the prepared cake pan and bake for 35-40 minutes until risen and cooked through (a skewer inserted in the center of the cake should come out clean).
Cool completely in the pan, then carefully turn out, remove the paper and transfer to a serving plate. Dust with icing sugar.

Makes 16 squares