Eggless Ginger biscuits

Last week, I tried this recipe, adapted from a book Celebrity Chefs' Cookbooks: Betty Saw, Cookies Galore.

I am very fond of the McVities Ginger nuts, a biscuit pack that I am likely to grab often. The love for the biscuits is so, that while in Egypt, I used to stop at the Shell pumping station's Select outlet in Cairo, just to pick them up. They were not available in the super markets in Port Said.

The book had a very workable recipe..but to my dismay, I can not just walk in to a store and pick most of the ingredients required. However, I wandered through the many sites and found
a way to make home made golden syrup and bought some interesting ginger jam which substitued preserved stem ginger ( preserved stem ginger can be made at home also) and I used freshly grated ginger too.

The resultant cookies were not really cookies but slightly thinner ginger biscuits which were a perfect match in texture and taste to my favourite McVities.

Now I have some more golden syrup left over from making 1/4th of the above recipe and would try the cookies again.

I give below the ingredients for the recipe the by Betty Saw for those who want to try the original. My substitutes are in brackets next to them. The method is similar to that given in her book, but the few alterations that arise with substitution of few ingredients.

Ingredients:

Shaped and hand moulded cookies/ Makes 62

Preparation time: 30 minutes/ Baking 15-20 minutes

400 grams/14 1/4 ounces/2&2/3 cups Self raising flour

1 1/2 teaspoon Baking powder

1/2 teaspoon Bicarbonate of soda

1 teaspoon Ground Ginger ( I grated 2" piece of fresh ginger)

50 grams /1 3/4 ounces Preserved Stem Ginger chopped finely (I used 3 table spoons ready to use ginger jam)

250 grams/9 ounces/1 cup soft margarine ( I mixed 100grams vegetable shotening to 150 grams margarine)

2 tablespoons Golden syrup

175 grams/6 1/4 ounces/3/4 cups Castor sugar

Method:

Line baking trays with non-stick baking sheet.

Sift together the flour, baking powder and the soda-bi-carbonate.
Mellt the margarine-shortening mix and the golden syrup. Remove from heat and stir in the stem ginger (ginger jam in this case along with the fresh ginger) and sugar.

Stir in the sifted dry ingredients to form a soft dough.

Roll this dough into walnut sized balls and place them on the prepared trays. ( I rolled them and pressed them down a bit, made a design with the back of a fork)

Pre heat the oven to 165 degrees C/330 degrees F ( My oven settings had only 10 degrees C increments, hence I set it to 170 degrees C)

Bake cookies for a good 18 minutes until golden brown.

Leave on the trays for a few minutes and cool them on wired racks.

They may feel soft while warm. On cooling they acquire a crunch and a harder texture.

The ginger jam had some small pieces of ginger in it and as with the bite, the feel of these pieces tasted purely delicious, that made me wonder how much preserved stem ginger would enhance the taste.

I took it for my friend's son who could not stop picking another even before he would finish one.

I am happy to have baked these even though they did not look anywhere comparable to the professionally baked picture that the book featured.

Find these Ginger nuts included in this month's edition of Baking from a book happening @ Ruchika cooks!