Recipe: Orange Blossom Scented Cookies

This may be a bit strange, but I’m obsessed with flower waters and floral foods in general. I already have rose water, rose tea, lavender earl grey, dried violets for tea and candied violets for decoration and, recently during my stay in London, I picked up Laduree’s  Matilde tea which is orange blossom water flavored.  This, of course made me buy orange blossom water (found at my local endian grocer) which is an ingredient in some recipes from my laduree cook book. I wanted to start with a simple recipe first so I made Orange Blossom Scented Butter Cookies.

The recipe I followed is from this website: www.yummly.com/recipe/Orange-scented-Butter-Cookies-626896

I used a half form of this recipe as followed (aka the transcribed recipe below is half of the recipe shown on the original site); it makes about 20 cookies:

·         125 grams butter (room temperature) <- this is an absolute must!

·         125 grams powdered sugar

·         1/2 eggs (room temperature) (about 2 Tablespoons of beaten egg)

·         325 grams flour (sifted)

·         milk (splash) or, enough to bring the dough together

·         1/2 tsp orange flower water

Preparation

1.    Mix all ingredients together, form the dough into a ball, cover, and refrigerate 1 hour. (I found it easiest to mix all the dry together, then mix in butter with my hands and then add the flower water and then enough milk to make a dough form)

2.    Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius. (which is about 355 Fahrenheit)

3.    Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

4.    Roll the ball out into 1/2 centimeter thickness and cut out shapes with your favorite cookie cutter. Lay each cookie on the baking sheet.

5.    Bake 10 minutes until golden. Let cool on a wire rack before enjoying.

At this point I tasted the cookies and found that they were too plain; so I added a glaze. It includes:

About ½ c. powdered sugar, ½ tsp orange flower water and about 2 tsp water. You want to add just enough water to form a thick, but drizzable paste. If it is too thin add more sugar because otherwise it will not dry. I mixed this with a fork.

I find these cookies to have a very feint orange flower taste; to make them to my liking I might add a full teaspoon of the water to the cookies next time. They really are more “scented”! The glaze I also find is really necessary because the cookies are also a bit dry. I find they taste good but are improved to quite lovely with the addition of a nice cup of tea or a chai latte.

Overall, I find this recipe to have been very successful! This is a great way to introduce others to orange blossom flower water (my dad has been converted; my mom still thinks it tastes like perfume) and are quite tasty.