I have been doing a lot of running recently. Slowly, after London I have been getting back into what keeps me sane and makes my jeans fit properly!
I had a terrible time with injury after the marathon and as well as suffering from dehydration I developed plantar fascitis – a horrible injury that affect the muscles and tendon on the arch of your foot and makes even walking painful. My lovely physio has made me better, and along with a very complicated pair of moulded insoles, I am back pounding the pavements with my rather large dog in tow each day.
When I am running, I always like to have something nice in the house to have a nibble on with a cuppa so that I don’t feel completely deprived. However, I do like to know exactly what goes into the treats I eat as I feel that then I have a little more control of my day to day eating.
When I stumbled on the recipe for Snickerdoodles in Rachel Allen’s Bake book I almost turned the page as I assumed they were named after the branded chocolate bar that is laden down with peanuts, caramel and chocolate. But on second look I realised that the recipe wasn’t really bad, and could be adapted to make it a little healthier. I have substituted some of the plain flour with wholewheat flour so that it is not all bad. And there is actually not a huge amount of butter in them as you get about 30 biscuits from the batter.
Preheat your oven to 180C and get 2 baking sheets ready. There is no need to grease or line them.
You will need,
125 g butter softened, 110g caster sugar (plus 1 dessert spoon for rolling) 1 egg lightly beaten, 1 tsp vanilla extract, 150g plain flour, 100g wholewheat flour, one half tsp nutmeg, 3/4tsp baking powder, pinch of salt, 1 dessertspoon of ground cinnamon.
Cream the butter in a mixer until softened and add the 110g sugar and beat until fluffy. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl a couple of times. Add the egg and vanilla and beat again.
Gently and gradually add the flours, nutmeg, baking powder and salt and mix to a dough.
In a separate bowl add the remaining caster sugar and cinnamon together. I have to confess that I halved the amount of cinnamon as I have a very careful relationship with cinnamon. I can tolerate a certain amount but once I cross that line, I start to feel unwell. Mad I know, but there you are!
Using your hand, take a teaspoon of dough and roll to a walnut sized ball. Roll in the cinnamon and sugar and place on the baking trays about an inch apart. Once you have rolled out the approx 30 balls flatten gently with the ball of your hand or a fork.
Bake for about 15 mins in the oven until hard around the edges. This will depend on your oven so just keep an eye on them. Allow to cool for a couple of minutes on the tray before moving to a wire rack.
These biscuits are fab. A crystallized coat of sugar and cinnamon gives way to a crumbling soft biscuit that hints of butter and nutmeg. The wholewheat flour gives it a slightly nutty flavour and almost makes them a health food in my eyes! I believe they would soak up the froth on a latte just lovely!
A strong coffee and a Just Doodle It (as I will be calling them) while sitting on the sofa post run will certainly make me feel like I deserve it.
Enjoy,
Orls xx
