Wicklewoods Date And Peanut Cookies Recipes

Steps:

• Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line one or more baking sheets with parchment. Place flour in a bowl and whisk in the salt, cinnamon and cloves. Set aside.
• Cream butter and brown sugar together by hand or in an electric mixer. Beat in eggs. The mixture will not be smooth. Dissolve the baking soda in 1 tablespoon hot water and stir it in. Stir in the dates and nuts. The batter will be heavy and not easy to mix. Work in the flour mixture, about a third at a time. If your electric mixer has a dough hook, use it for working in the flour.
• Scoop heaping teaspoons of batter onto prepared baking sheet or sheets, making craggy mounds about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Space them about 1 1/2 inches apart; the cookies will not spread very much. (Alternatively, for neater cookies, you can roll the batter into balls between your palms, then lightly press them down with the back of a spoon or the tines of a fork.) Allow to sit at room temperature 30 minutes to 1 hour before baking. Depending on the size of your oven and your baking sheets, you can form the cookies ready to bake on sheets of parchment paper on your countertop, then transfer them to baking sheets in shifts.
• Bake 15 to 20 minutes, until nicely browned. Let cool, then dust with sifted confectioners' sugar. If you plan to freeze some of the cookies, do not dust them with confectioners' sugar; wait until after they thaw.

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 180.
• Grease and lightly flour a 1lb loaf tin.
• Cut a length of greaseproof paper half the width of the loaf tin and twice the length, line the tin lengthways ensuring it overlaps at the ends.
• In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until smooth, slowly add the beaten egg.
• Heat the milk in a saucepan, add the oil, syrup and treacle until melted, and then beat into the butter mixture, along with the 1 ½ oz chopped walnuts.
• Sift in the flour, baking powder and spices and mix well.
• In a pan, heat the dates, water, lemon zest and juice until boiling, reduce heat and simmer until soft.
• Remove from heat and puree with a blender until smooth.
• Place half of the cake mix in the bottom of the loaf tin, ensuring not to remove the lining paper, level with a palette knife.
• Spread the date puree over the cake mix, almost to the edges of the tin.
• Cover with the remaining cake mix.
• Bake for 25 mins, don't remove from tin.
• Mix all the topping ingredients together and sprinkle over the cooked cake, return to the oven and bake for a further 15-20 minutes.
• Leave to cool for 10 mins before using the overlapping greaseproof paper to remove the cake from tin and transferring to a cooling rack.