Friday, June 12, 2009

Chocolate-orange cookie stacks

The best way to describe these cookies are as a cross between Oreo cookies and Terry's chocolate oranges.
Don't be put off by the pastry shop look, these are surprisingly easy to make. But you'll need to start early to let them chill in the fridge. This recipe, from Bon Appetit magazine, would be ideal for last-minute guests had there been no chilling time involved.

All you need is an orange, whipping cream, chocolate wafer cookies, and some orange juice concentrate. You might even have all the required ingredients in your fridge right now. So hop to it and try these out.
You can find the recipe here.

Substitutions: As I am apt to do, and so should all of you, I click on readers' comments as soon as I am done reading the recipe - and before I make my shopping list.

Several readers were quick to point out that their cream didn't whip. Those who cut down on the amount of orange juice concentrate that the recipe called for were more successful. Fortunately for me, I only used 1/3 cup of orange juice concentrate and my cream whipped into soft peaks without any problem at all. Furthermore, the orange flavour was decidedly more subtle than tart and biting - just the way I like it.

Would I make this again? I'll have to sleep on this one. While I love the combination of chocolate and orange, chilling these wafers softens their consistency into more of a cake-like texture and just one cookie stack is all I could handle at one time.

Not only that, one box of wafers made only seven cookie stacks, while I had plenty of cream left over. To serve these to guests or friends, you'll have to buy several boxes of wafers and it's been my experience that not everyone loves this flavour combination.

Still, the idea is a good one and I may experiment with other flavours in the cream such as ground hazelnuts, perhaps almond or raspberry extract, offset with shaved almonds or fresh raspberries on top.

Grade: Four stars out of five. Full marks for appearance and ease. Let's be frank - anyone can whip some cream into shape and the white against the dark wafers is elegant and chic. Still though, I'm waffling on giving this full marks because of the taste and texture.

1 comment:

Maria said...

What fun cookies! Chocolate and orange are the perfect combo!