This recipe was inspired by a recipe that Giada DeLaurentiis made on her cooking show Everyday Italian. Ricotta in cookies may seem strange, but it makes the cookies oh-so moist and chewy. Giada made lemon ricotta cookies with a lemon glaze, but I thought it would be fun to modify the recipe for Halloween.
I added pandan to the batter to give the cookies a spooky green tint. After baking, I covered the cookies with a carrot glaze. The orange color really evokes Halloween. To finish the cookies, I sprinkled on some orange, green and black Halloween sprinkles.
This Halloween, while the kids are over-loading on sugar from too many cloyingly sweet candy bars, the grown-ups can have something to enjoy, too.
1. Info for Halloween Pandan Ricotta Cookies with Carrot Icing
- Cook Time: unavailable
- Total Time: unavailable
- Servings: 42
- Calories: unavailable
2. Ingredients for Halloween Pandan Ricotta Cookies with Carrot Icing
- 2 eggs
- 2/3 cup sugar
- 2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 2-1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1-1/2 tablespoons pandan paste (see tips)
- 15 ounces ricotta cheese (1-1/2 cups)
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 5 tablespoons fresh carrot juice
- 1/3 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/3 cup Halloween sprinkle toppings
3. Directions:
- Preheat the oven to 350°F.
- In a mixing bowl, beat the eggs with 1/3 cup of sugar for about 5 minutes. You’ll get a pale yellow foam and the texture of the egg yolk will be thicker. Add the brown sugar and ricotta cheese.
- In a bowl, combine the flour, salt and baking powder. Sift all the dry ingredients.
- Cream the butter with the remaining sugar (whisk using a standmixer to get as much air as possible in the butter). Add the egg mixture and the dry ingredients. Add the pandan paste. It will bring a distinct green color to the dough. Mix well.
- Place a silicon mat or a sheet of parchment paper on a baking sheet. Place the cookie dough about 2 tablespoons at a time onto the prepared baking sheet (or use a cookie scoop). Make sure to space the cookies about 2 inches apart so that they don’t touch each other as they will expand when they bake.
- Bake the cookies for 20 minutes. Don’t over bake them; you want them to be moist and chewy. Remove from the oven.
- Layer a cooling rack on top of a baking sheet (for easy clean-up of the carrot icing). Transfer the cookies onto the cooling rack.
- In a bowl, dissolve the carrot juice in powdered sugar. Add the ground ginger. Set aside.
- Drizzle each cookie with 3/4 teaspoon of carrot icing and top with the Halloween sprinkles.
- Let the carrot icing harden completely for about 2 hours.
- Bon appétit!
