Almond Cookies for Sweet Punch March 2011

  This month Ria of Ria's Collection has chosenthe recipe form Manjula's Kitchen.  Manjula's Kitchen is a very popular Indian recipe, I'm sure all Indian food lovers must have known her recipes .  Our challenge for this month is to bake Whole wheat eggless almond cookies.  Without any doubt Manjula's recipes always taste the best.

   My cookies didn't spread much but it tasted absolutely delicious.  I made only a few batch and it disappeared in minutes.  I haven't changed anything much in the recipe, except for sugar and along with cardamom, I also added saffron. I love the flavour of saffron and cardamom together, since they go well with each other.  I hope you enjoy baking these aromatic cookies in your home...

Preparation Time: 15 minutes
Cooking Time:  10 minutes
Makes about 30 tiny almond shaped cookies

Ingredients:
Whole wheat flour- 1 cup
Butter- 1/2 cup( softened)
Brown sugar- 1/2 cup
Cardamom powder- 1/2 tsp
Sliced almonds- 1/4 cup
Saffron- about 5 strands soaked in 2 tsp of warm milk
A pinch of salt

Note:
You can replace brown sugar with normal white sugar and also avoid using saffron if you don't want to.

Method:
   Mix the flour, sugar, salt and cardamom powder in a large bowl.  Add the softened butter to the flour mixture and start working with your hand, then add the saffron soaked milk and bring it together like a dough. If it doesn't come together, add some more milk.
    Preheat the oven to 180 degree Celsius.  Roll out the dough between two sheets of baking paper and cut it using a cookie cutter.  Place it in a greased baking sheet, leaving enough space between each cookies.  Bake it in the preheated oven for 5 to 7 minutes, until the cookies looks lightly brown on top.  Remove it from the oven, leave it in the tray for 5 minutes, then transfer it to a wire rack and let it cool down completely.  Store the cookies in an air tight container.
   If you don't want to use cookie cutter.  After making the dough, divide the dough into small balls and place it in a baking sheet.  Press it slightly on top to flatten.  Bake it in the preheated oven for about 12 to 15 minutes, until they look brown on the sides.  Take it out from the oven and let it cool down in the tray for 3 minutes.  Transfer it to a wire rack and cool down completely.  Once cooled down store it in a air tight container.
Enjoy these aromatic cookies with your evening tea.