Sweet Potato Flour Spice Cookies, Gluten Free and Flavor Full

Buckwheat and Sweet Potato Flour Spice Cookies

My Little Blue Heron

Fragrant, aromatic spices combine with earthy buckwheat flour, Peruvian sweet potato flour, brown sugar and pecans for a perfect nibble. 

Vanilla powder is, for serious d'Gluties, a reliable go-to vanilla source. (I like Baldwin's Vanilla Extract from West Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Find them online, but I think you still have to call them to order: (413) 232-7785).

You can form these into rolls and slice and bake them, even freezing the rolls in parchment or waxed paper. Or you can form the cookies and freeze them on sheets and bake them off when you want some. 

Be happy, healthy, peaceful and feel at ease in and out of your kitchen.

xojane

Dry ingredients (whisk together in a bowl and set aside):

100 g. buckwheat flour (Arrowhead Mills is a good choice)

45 g. sweet potato flour (mine's from Peru) Find on Amazon.com

¼ tsp. vanilla powder (you can add 1 tsp. liquid vanilla extract to the butter/sugar/egg mixture if you  

        don't have vanilla powder.) I buy mine at vitacost.com

1 ½ tsp. ground cinnamon 

¼ tsp. ground cloves (freshly ground, if you can)

¼ tsp. ground nutmeg (freshly ground only)

¼ tsp. mace (easy to find at Indian grocers)

1 tsp. Kosher salt

½ tsp. baking soda

Make the Vanilla Browned Butter:

Render 12 oz. unsalted butter to make ‘ghee’, melting over medium heat in a small saucepan, with 3 vanilla beans, scraped, including the pods. Skim the foam that rises to the top and continue to gently boil the butter until it stops making any bubbling noise. This is when it begins to brown. Swirl the butter fairly often so the it browns evenly and doesn’t burn. When the butter reaches a nutty brown color and scent, remove from burner and pour through a fine sieve into a container (glass is best). Set aside to cool. Do this before you make the cookies. You can make a big batch of this. It will keep indefinitely and is great to use in so many recipes.

Remaining Ingredients:

113 g. vanilla browned butter

1 egg, size large, pasture eggs are lovely, but whatever you've got at home is fine, at room temperature

100 g. dark brown sugar

112 grams of pecans, toasted, cooled and chopped coarsely (substitute your favorite nut)

Optional 10X (powdered) sugar, sifted for coating cookies. 

Procedure:

In the bowl of an electric stand mixer, cream together 113 g. vanilla browned butter (weigh it!) with brown sugar and egg until light and fluffy.

Dump in dry ingredients and mix on low until incorporated. Increase speed and mix until well-combined. Just before mix is completely combined, add pecans and finish mixing.

One method: Remove bowl and roll batter into logs, approximately 1 ½” in circumference. You can do this in waxed paper or parchment paper. Twist the ends to ‘close’ the logs and chill until firm (at least a few hours or overnight.) You can freeze the rolls, too. If you freeze them, when you remove them from the freezer, slice them and bake them frozen. You’ll add on a few minutes to the baking time.

Another good method: Using a small cookie scoop, or two teaspoons, drop the cookies on parchment linked baking sheets, leaving room between the scoops. Using the tines of a fork, press down, turn the fork at a 45-degree angle and press again (like making peanut butter cookies.) If the batter is too sticky, you can refrigerate it, or dampen the tines. Sprinkle a little Turbinado sugar on each cookie and bake. (Truc: If you like 'salty-sweet', combine some coarse salt, like Maldon Salt with the sugar, to taste, and sprinkle on top of your cookies.)

The Bake:

Preheat oven to 350º F. and line a couple of baking sheets with parchment paper. Set oven racks to upper and lower third of oven.

Slice cookies about ¼” thin (if you like very thin wafers like I do.)

Or drop method (see above.)

Bake in preheated oven until brown, taking care to not burn them. Transfer top to bottom, back to front after about 5 minutes (or half way through the bake, depending on your method and cookie-largeness. 

Cool on racks. Optional coating with 10X.

Play around: Make sandwiches with apricot or raspberry jam. Add some melted dark chocolate. Omit the jam and sandwich with chocolate or dip in chocolate if that's your jam. 
xojane