The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network. Now, I only had time for the "Milan" cookies which... which was too bad because I know I would love the marhsmallow bars, but hopefully I'll get to try those sometime. I've had the Pepperidge Farm Milanos, which look exactly like these Milans, so I was pretty much expecting these cookies to turn out that way...
The Milanos weren't great.. first, I definitely piped them too thick so they all spread out and ran into eachother in the oven.
I also was busy working on a birthday cake and a blueberry buckle and these Milano cookies were just an afterthought... so when I was trying to jam my third cookie sheet into the oven, the parchment paper slipped off onto the floor. Haha.. so I had a smaller batch than normal.
The batter itself was interesting, basically a buttercream (butter and powdered sugar) and then you mix in a bunch of egg whites and vanilla and lemon extract. It was tasty batter, light and airy.
The real Milano cookies like Pepperidge Farm makes are light and sandy, but unfortuantely these resulted in chewy things, and possibly because I underbaked .. or who knows. The chocolate filling was cream, chocolate, and orange rind (orange chocolate ganache) so these had a lovely citrus overtone... not exactly the classic Milano but more like the orange version they sell at the store.
All in all, this recipe wasn't what I was expecting and I didn't execute it very well and it wasn't my best Daring Baker showing, but it was tasty cookie and a fun experience and I am glad for the opportunity. Thanks!
I had problems with them being limp and chewy too, but I felt it was due to the hunidity here. I also thought there was too much lemon extract in them. Regardless, yours did come out lovely, even though you didn't care for them. I'd scarf 'em down 1-2-3 :)
ReplyDeleteI only made the marshmallow ones....and still need to take a photo actually. Yours look great!
ReplyDeleteYep mine were soggy and chewy too...and it's a cold winter here. I also had trouble with piping it and ended up with trays and trays to put in the oven! I thought the batter was too runny for it!
ReplyDeleteBut yours turned out so much better than mine! They look great!
Yum!! Your cookies look amazing =D. I'm sorry that they didn't appeal to you.
ReplyDeleteThey looks delicious!
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry they didn’t worked for you.
Nicely done.