Almond & Orange Biscuits...

It was my BDay yesterday and yes I baked a cake but I also baked some cookies. I wanted to make my Dad's cookies but decided against it and instead I tried something completely new. The Cointreau is completely my idea and it worked beautiful!!! Hope you'll try them one day - oh, just one thing, in the recipe for the basic almond cookies it says that I should have approx. 25 biscuits, well I got only 16 out of that amount of the dough, but it can be easily doubled - which I'll do next time!


About Cointreau liqueur..."it's a brand of triple sec liqueur, and is produced in Saint-Barthélemy-d'Anjou, a suburb of Angers, France. Cointreau sources its bitter oranges from all over the world, usually Spain, Brazil and Saint-Raphaël, Haiti. Alexis Lichine states that its primitive name was "Curaçao Blanco Triple Sec". In addition to being imbibed as an apéritif, Cointreau is sometimes used as a digestive. Cointreau is considered to be either a triple sec or a unique category of liqueur. With a 40% alcohol content, Cointreau is strong for triple sec, which usually has an alcohol content of between 15 and 40 percent." - by Wikipedia.org
For more info go to the official web site
P.S. I love this liqueur :D

How to make it...
Ingredients:
- 120 g plain flour
- 30 g ground almonds
- 60 g caster sugar
- 60 g butter
- 1 egg yolk (from a large egg)
- 2 tablespoons Cointreau liqueur
For the icing
- 90 g icing sugar
- 1 tablespoon Cointreau
- 2 tablespoons warm water
- 30 g nibbed almonds, toasted


Preheat the oven to 180 C. Mix the sieved flour, ground almonds and sugar in a large bowl and rub in the butter until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Add the egg yolk and Cointreau and mix together well to form a dough. Leave to rest for 10 min.
On a lightly floured surface roll the dough until approx. 4 mm thick. Cut into shapes of your choice. Place on a baking sheet and bake for about 10 minutes or until golden brown. Allow to coll completely on a wire rack.
To make the icing: sift the icing sugar and add the Cointreau and water. Stir until smooth, adding more water if required. Spoon a little icing into the centre of each biscuit and smooth out to the edges. Sprinkle immediately with toasted almonds and leave to set.

Bon appétit!