Maple Pecan & Pistachio Cardamom Cookies

Bringing classic combinations from North America and India for these delightfully addictive, maple pecan & pistachio cardamom cookies. 

Its officially thanksgiving season in Canada! And it is Diwali season in India. Yayyyyyy… I love festive months. What’s better than chilly days, accompanied by tons of cozy food and no taboo on sweets and desserts? Oh, I know! Leaves turning orange, red, yellow, Halloween and Stranger Things Season 2. Clearly, there is a lot to be excited about. And if you haven’t watched Stranger Things yet, you still have 22 days to catch up!

I scrapped my initial blog calendar for this month and decided to do only desserts. Cookies and cakes – rich, indulgent, special, everything with cream and frosting! I remember, in India, if you visited someone during Diwali, you could without fail expect to be served a plate (or plates) of store-bought sweets and homemade deep-fried treats. I am not sure if it is still the same, if people still celebrate with the same fervor. If sweets are shared with neighbors and if the ladies (mostly) toil away in the kitchen to create a variety of homemade treats. I would like to think they do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I thought of making something with very common Indian mithai (sweets) flavors and colors – pistachio and cardamom. I wish I had some edible gold leaf paper to daintily lay over the cookies it would feel like something out of an Indian sweets shop. I added turmeric to the frosting for that perfect pale-yellow color. It is almost in the same vein as my last year’s Diwali post but much more simple and less involved.

Then for thanksgiving, ofcourse it is mandatory almost to have pumpkin desserts. But can I confess that I am not a big fan of pumpkin?? Oh no… are you going to unfollow this blog immediately and never return back?? Wait.. I promise I will give it a try. See, it is a new flavor for me… so I feel like it will take some getting used to. Just like cinnamon. I could not stand cinnamon in desserts, but now I can tolerate it. I even use it as you will see in the recipe below in small quantities. I am sure pumpkin desserts and I will be on good terms in a couple of thanksgivings. In the meantime though, I made pumpkin shaped cookies that are actually another classic fall flavor – pecan cookies dressed with maple icing,  and it was not even inspired by this article.

For the maple pecan cookies, I used frosting type of glaze adapted from Half Baked Harvest because this is so much more flavorful than royal icing. But if you want your decoration to look more perfect, you can use royal icing. This is the first time, I tried cookie decorating and it was so much fun. For those of you who have kids, do you have super-fun cookie-decorating sessions? If you are interested in sugar cookie decorating, I found this website quite helpful. My decorating was not perfect in anyway but I had fun doing it and then “testing” the cookies, which is what it is supposed to be right?

Notes

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1. I would recommend chilling the dough overnight and baking them in the morning for minimal spreading and the added benefit of the home being filled with the aroma of freshly baked cookies first thing in the morning. If not, chill the dough for atleast 2 hours.
2. I found these tips from Sweetopia handy for controlling cookie spreading
3. Sift the icing sugar for the maple frosting to avoid having lumps in your icing.
4. For the green pumpkin stems, I simply poured the green icing into a ziplock. Let it sit for a bit to thicken, then snip off a tiny bit and pipe the twirly stems. 
5. I wanted to make a smaller batch of cookies so I used half an egg for each cookie dough. But I know some people hate doing this so you easily double the quantities and you will have 30 cookies of each type.
6. If you are making the cookies without the icing / frosting, you can increase the sugar to ½ cup for more sweetness.
7. These cookies are on the soft side. That’s how we like them so I baked them for exactly 10 mins.
   

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 Maple Pecan Cookies

Ingredients – 15 cookies
1 stick (½ cup) butter – softened
6 tbsps sugar
½ (2 tbsps) lightly beaten egg
1/8 tsp vanilla extract
tiniest drop of almond extract (optional)
½ cup pecans – toasted and coarsely ground with a pinch of salt
1 cup whole wheat flour
¼ tsp cinnamon

For the Icing
½ stick of butter
¾ – 1 cup of icing sugar
3 – 4 tbsps maple syrup

Bake the cookies

1. Beat butter and sugar till well combined. Don’t overbeat it.
2. Add 2tbsp of beaten egg and mix again till combined. Add the extracts if using.
3. Whisk ground pecans, whole wheat flour and cinnamon together. Add to the wet ingredients and mix with a wooden spoon just until combined.
4. Drop onto a lightly floured parchment paper. Place a long strip of clingwrap over the dough to avoid sticking to the rolling pin. Roll out the dough evenly to ¼th inch thickness.
5. Gently slide the parchment paper alongwith the rolled out dough covered by clingwrap onto a baking sheet. Refrigerate overnight or atleast 2 hours.
6. Preheat oven to 350F. Remove rolled out cookie dough from the fridge. Cut out pumpkin or desired shapes with a cookie cutter. Re-roll scraps on lightly floured surface and cut out shapes till all the dough is used up.
7. Bake for 10 mins for slightly soft cookies. Remove from oven. Let cool for 15 minutes. Transfer to cooling rack and let cool completely before icing.

Mix the icing

1. Melt the butter for 15-20 seconds until just melted. If too hot, let cool slightly.
2. Add the maple syrup and sift ¾ cup of the icing sugar into the melted butter.
3. Whisk till smooth. Add more sugar if the icing needs thickening.
4. Divide the icing – place ¾ of the icing in one small bowl and add 2 drops of orange color. Add a drop of bright green to the rest of the icing. I spread the orange icing with a small spoon and for the green icing i used a ziplock. If the icing gets too thick while decorating, just stick in the microwave for 5 seconds.
5. Have fun decorating the cooled cookies.

Pistachio Cardamom Cookies

Ingredients – 15 cookies
1 stick (½ cup) butter – softened
6 tbsps sugar
½ (2 tbsps) lightly beaten egg
1/8 tsp vanilla extract
tiniest drop of almond extract (optional)
½ cup pistachios – toasted and coarsely ground with a pinch of salt
1 cup whole wheat flour
¼ tsp cardamom

For the frosting
1tbsp milk
¼ tsp turmeric
1 stick (½ cup) butter – softened
1 ½ cups of icing sugar
¼ tsp cardamom
pinch of salt
1tbsp sour cream

 

Bake the cookies

1. Beat butter and sugar till well combined. Don’t overbeat it.
2. Add 2tbsp of beaten egg and mix again till combined. Add the extracts if using.
3. Keep 2tbsp of the ground pistachio aside for garnish. Whisk the rest with the whole wheat flour and cardamom. Add to the wet ingredients and mix with a wooden spoon until just combined.
4. Drop onto a lightly floured parchment paper. Place a long strip of clingwrap over the dough to avoid sticking to the rolling pin. Roll out the dough evenly to ¼th inch thickness.
5. Gently slide the parchment paper alongwith the rolled-out dough covered by clingwrap onto a baking sheet. Refrigerate overnight or atleast 2 hours.
6. Preheat oven to 350F. Remove rolled out cookie dough from the fridge. Cut out rounds or desired shapes with a cookie cutter. Re-roll scraps on lightly floured surface and cut out shapes till all the dough is used up.
7. Bake for 10 mins for slightly soft cookies. Remove from oven. Let cool for 15 minutes. Transfer to cooling rack and let cool completely before frosting.

Whip up the frosting

1. Heat the milk with the turmeric for 10-15 seconds. Let cool completely.
2. Beat the butter and sugar till pale.
3. Add the cardamom, milk & turmeric mixture, sour cream, salt. Beat till fluffy.
4. Spread frosting on cookies and sprinkle with ground pistachios.

Recipe adapted from Sweetopia