to explain the coconut

So far August has been a month of revelations. Apart from being irritatingly monsoon-y, that is.

First there was the fact that I actually enjoy cookies. Quite an eye-opener. Then, Saturday at the office we found out that I can sop up eight whole chicken rolls in 30 minutes flat, when facing a bet.

Wow. I’m like this whole new person.

And it doesn’t stop there. Yesterday, after a particularly long evening at the supermarket, I came to the conclusion that I should not be let loose un-supervised in a supermarket. Because if I am then I’ll return home with half a kilo (a little more than a pound) of desiccated coconut, half a kilo of dried and pitted prunes and a jar of crystallized ginger for absolutely no reason.

I love supermarkets of course. I love that I can look at a shelf of canned tomatoes and think of making pasta. Or, I pick a head of cabbage and I know I might want to make a sabzi out of it. And that’s enough reason for them to end up in my cart. But a half a kilo of desiccated coconut? Where did that come from? If you’re raising your eyebrows at me right now, well then, save it. I can blame the candied ginger to my subconscious mind; I’ve been wanting to do a ginger cake for a long time without actually DOING anything about it. I can understand the prunes — I loved them when I made Nigella’s Christmas Cake last Christmas, so I knew I’d be half-happy snacking on them all day. But the coconut? I’m not even going to try and explain it.

For the rest of the day I sat with my legs propped up on the balcony railing checking out all that’s fugly while the rain thundered on outside. And all throughout, that bag of coconut sat on the counter giving me the I’m-waiting-for-you eyes. Stupid transparent bag.

In the end, when there’s a persistent bag of coconut waiting, there’s not much you can do except turn on the laptop and get out the old cloth-covered monster that is my recipe book. The bright screen and a couple of folded down pages threw up a mix of mind-boggling coconuttiness. It was like I was in a snowball fight. Except that there was no snow, only white sweet powdered coconut.

the baby rattles and teethers of our world

Alright folks. At this point you’re obviously under the impression that I’ve abandoned you. One week seems like ages in blog years. And a long time to be away from this place.

The weather meanwhile has gone from furnace-hot to pre-monsoon cloudy. And right now, from where I’m sitting, this is what the sky looks like:

I spend a large amount of my weekend blitzing up cocoa, chilled milk and ice cubes in the blender while the sky set my kitchen aglow – the eerie red made the kitchen look like hell’s waiting room. I also spent a blissful Saturday afternoon eating crispy bacon right out of the pan – few things in life can beat crispy bacon right out of the pan. Which was followed by beating butter into flour for cookies with a whisk while my fingers were still slick with pork fat. There was a lot of hullabaloo on Sunday about a family friend’s birthday dinner during which, a plateful of tandoori chicken almost made me cry out with pleasure. But more than anything else, chicken or weather, I need to tell you about cookies.

Cookies are like the baby rattles and teethers of our world. With all the chocolate mousse and double-layered cakes taking over the main events of our lives, we have cookies to help us with the transitions. They’re not ever the pièce de résistance of a meal, in fact they only very rarely feature in a meal. But they fill in the essential gaps in our lives. Keep us together after a heartbreak, keep us sane during an impromptu friends-over-for-a-party time, see us through an especially engaging book, keep our cocktails occupied, keep us fed during the madness bred by deadlines. Actually, you know, now that I think about it, cookies maybe the thing that keeps us from falling apart at crucial crossings.

Anywho…

Before we begin, you need to add these items to your next week’s grocery list:

Butter
Flour
Black Peppercorns
Ginger
Sugar

And that’s about all these cookies need. Smear on some Nutella, sprinkle on some salt if you need to be fancy, but these cookies don’t need much maintenance. They bake in a jiffy, are utterly addictive and super-impressive when it comes to taking on a vast array of toppings. Over the last few days, I’ve loaded them with jam, pickles, cream cheese, whipped cream and of course, my personal favourite, dollops of  Nutella. And on a particularly lazy Sunday afternoon, I spent my time dunking these in my mug of Darjeeling.

These are essentially butter cookies. Essentially. And yes yes yes, all you health nuts out there are probably pursing your lips right now, but tell me honestly – if you weren’t worrying about your next spin class, would you give up on butter-cookies? Like ever?

No.

So let’s just get on with all the butteriness.

Ginger and Black Pepper Cookies

225 gms of unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup of powdered sugar
2 cups + 2 tbsp of all-purpose flour
2 tbsp freshly cracked black pepper
2 tbsp grated ginger [or ginger paste, pulp and juice]
1/2 tsp salt

With an electric beater, beat the butter with sugar till it turns light and fluffy. Add the black pepper and ginger and beat for another minute till they’re incorporated into the butter. Dump in the flour and salt and with a spoon, work the dough till it turns lumpy and clumps around the spoon. Turn the dough out on to a flat surface and knead it lightly into a ball. Don’t overwork the dough. Treat it like you would treat a shortcrust pastry dough. Break lumps off the dough and roll them into balls. Flatten the balls between your palms and press the tops lightly with the twines of a fork . Lay the cookies out on a cookie sheet or a baking tray and pop them into the refrigerator for 10-15 minutes.

Pre-heat the oven to 170 deg C. Bake the cookies till they change colour only slightly or till they’re no more soft to the touch. This may take anywhere from 15-25 minutes. I would suggest you start watching them from the 10-12 minute mark. Take the cookies off the sheet while they’re still hot and let cool completely. Store in an air-tight container.