Red Velvet Toffee Snap Cookies

Of course, you probably know me very well for invading Vocal with my film studies stuff and articles entitled ‘a filmmaker’s guide’. I have often explained that I love to bake as well. Since I was young, I have loved the idea, the creativity and the relaxation of baking different things. I love to make macarons, layer cakes and gingerbread in particular and the activity of it really gets me away from my laptop (where I’m sure you know that I spend most of my life). So, I hope you enjoy me talking about what I bake and why I bake it complete with pictures (if not very good) of me actually baking, my baked goods in the process of being created and when they’re finished. I’m really happy to share this with you. And if you like, you can show me your baking (yes, I spend a lot of time writing, but I also spend a lot of time reading other people’s articles!), I would love to see it. Since I was in school, I was always interested in creating things, whether that be pieces of writing, welding things to make small statues or baking foods and making sweets (candy, if you’re American). I hope you enjoy looking at some of the stuff that has honestly kept me sane, because I seem to be going slightly mad.

Red Velvet Toffee Snap Cookies

I am not normally the person who enjoys red velvet anything, but I really enjoyed these ones because they're not as tart and sweet as normal red velvet and it is not as big as a cake. It goes well with a black coffee and it has a lovely texture of a snap and crumble in your mouth and so, you can enjoy it with a hot drink without the classic fear of it breaking off and falling in. These little thin biscuits are the guilty pleasure you need; the petite quality of them means you can enjoy one without feeling the bloat of eating biscuits as we do. A perfect snack, they can even be topped with a dollop of cream cheese for a mid-afternoon nibble.

Let's have a look how we make them then...

You will need:

• 175g Softened Butter
• 200g Brown Sugar
• 100g Caster Sugar
• 1 Egg
• 2 and a half tsp Vanilla Extract
• 225g Plain Flour
• 1tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
• 25g Cocoa Powder
• 25g Toffee Hot Chocolate Powder
• 2tsp Red Food Colouring

Instructions

1. Preheat your oven to 200C and line a baking tray with parchment paper. Do not use oil to grease it if you don't have parchment paper because this oil will seep into the cookies and disrupt the snapping texture as it cooks
2. Cream together the butter and sugars, add the egg without beating it and mix it into the mixture. I say not to beat the egg because the more you stir the egg, the fluffier the mixture will get and therefore again, you may disrupt the snap texture when you put it in the oven. Make sure you don't over-mix after you've added the egg
3. Add the cocoa powder, the toffee hot chocolate powder, the bicarbonate of soda and the red food colouring into a separate bowl. Mix these together until they have blended with each other
4. Put this mixture and the flour into the main bowl with the sugars, butter and egg mixture and mix them all together

Part 2

1. Grab a teaspoon and put half of the teaspoon's worth of mixture upon it. This will make one cookie. Place these on the parchment paper about a thumb's distance apart
2. Bake in the oven for 10 minutes for a smooth snap and 13 minutes for a hard, crunchy snap.
3. Allow ten minutes for cooling time and leave the cookies on the tray - we are not quite done yet...

Decoration

1. Take a big sheet of parchment paper and cut it into thin strips.
2. Place these strips diagonally across the cookies whilst they are still on the tray so that it looks like stripy
3. Grab some icing sugar and a sieve.
4. Sieve the mixture atop the cookie tray, making sure the stripes do not move and that you give a generous amount to each cookie
5. Now, they are all ready to eat

Enjoy!

I think I am going to enjoy these...a lot