WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, *GHOST NOISES*. HALLOWEEN. DEAD THINGS. VAMPIRES. MURDER. HORROR. MATCHA. Wait, what? It’s everyone’s America’s favourite spooky “holiday” (my parent’s wedding anniversary), and in amongst baking pumpkin into everything possible I’ve actually (accidentally) made something that qualifies as a Halloween bake. I had some leftover Matcha from the cake I baked for my feature in Reveal Magazine and I was just trying to work out what I wanted to put it into. I always knew it was going to be something involving white chocolate, because the two flavours go together so well. I baked these Matcha & White Choc Chip Cookies once and then later that day had an email pop into my work inbox about a Halloween charity bake sale we were having this week.
It wasn’t until that came into my inbox that I really thought about how Halloween-y these cookies really are. With the green colouring the matcha adds there’s something particularly ghoulish about them. I mean, on their own they aren’t quite spooky enough, so I had a think about a few different things I could do. Option 1 was to melt some white chocolate, dye it red and dip them in then have it trickle down like blood, but on the day not a single shop near me had any decent white chocolate, and I’m not melting any of that milky bar crap (I’m grouchy today, ok). So I went with option 2, which was slightly more time consuming and fiddly and gave me mixed results, mainly due to my poor piping skills. I melted down some dark chocolate, cut a tiny hole in the end of my piping bag (and I mean tiny, about 1mm) and piped on 30 individual spiderwebs. 
The recipe itself mainly just uses a cookie recipe I’ve used before, but with added matcha and different chocolate chips. Then rather than pushing together the 30 balls into 15 cookies I left them as 30 individual cookies and they are still a good size. They’d still work just as well as larger cookies if you wanted. Note: I am already annoyed at the dark nights and photographing with my lighting kit rather than natural light.
What are you making for Halloween? Are you dressing up? Do you think it’s a completely pointless overly commercialised American holiday we shouldn’t acknowledge? Do you not really care and just want to dress up as a dead thing and get smashed? So many questions!
- 280g all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1½ tsps cornflour
- 1 heaped tsp matcha powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 170 grams unsalted butter, melted
- 150 grams light brown sugar, loosely packed
- 100 grams granulated sugar
- 1 large egg & 1 egg yolk
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 120 grams good quality white chocolate, chopped
- (Optional, for the Halloween twist) 100g Dark Chocolate, Melted
- Mix together the dry ingredients (including the matcha) in a large bowl and set aside.
- Whisk together the melted butter and both sugars until there are no lumps of brown sugar remaining. Then whisk in the whole egg, followed by the egg yolk and the vanilla.
- Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix together until combined into a very soft dough. Fold in the chocolate chips until they are evenly distributed amongst the dough.
- Place the dough in the fridge for at LEAST two hours. This stage cannot be skipped. The longer the better (overnight would be good).
- Removed the dough 10 minutes before using so it can soften slightly.
- Preheat the oven to 160°C (150°C fan assisted) and line a baking sheet with parchment.
- Divide the dough into 30 even balls.
- Spread out the cookies on the baking tray (you will need to do this in 2, maybe 3 batches, depending on the size of your sheet). Giving them enough room for spreading out. Press gently but do not flatten. Place the other ones back in the fridge while the first batch bakes.
- Bake for 11-13 minutes. Never go longer than 13, they will continue to cook on the sheet as they cool. Allow to cool for 10 minutes on the sheet before transferring to a wire rack.
- Repeat with the other batches. These cookies can last up to 7 days and the dough is freezable.
- (Optional, for the halloween cookies) Melt the dark chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of hot water (don't let the bottom of the bowl touch the water), stirring constantly. Transfer to a piping bag with the end cut off (with a hole of about 1mm) and pipe the spiderswebs onto the top of each cookie. Allow to set before serving.
It’s the old food blogger problem, do you photograph at night or not. I go with no because I just get too worked up with how bad my photos are. I’d still make and eat these. What matcha powder did you use?
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It’s always a nightmare. In Leeds I worked a 10 minute walk from home so I could do it on my lunch break. Here I don’t have that option. My lighting set up helps, but isn’t ideal.
This was teapigs matcha, you’d be ok with most though.
I know what you mean. I found myself getting up at 6am yesterday to take some brownie photos!