Green Tea Cookies

Green tea - full of anti-oxidants and my staple drink. I drink it hot or cold, every day, winter or summer. And matcha, which is the powdered version of green tea is probably one of the best flavours out there. Matcha ice-cream is superb!

For Christmas, I have decided to not make the normal Greek Christmas Kourabiedes cookies but make these. I found this recipe in Keiko Ishida's Okashi cookbook, which is full of wonderful recipes.

These disappeared almost immediately. I managed to save a few for my good friend Eleni and she loves them! I will get more matcha in the near future, so I can make more Green Tea inspired bakes.

Keiko adds more green tea leaves as a garnish on top of each cookie, but I didn't want to make it too strong in the tea flavour department, so I omitted that last ingredient. You can add it if you want, but the matcha adds enough of a punch on its own.

Ingredients:  (makes about 40 - 50 small cookies)

240g of pastry flour, chilled
15g of green tea powder Matcha (about 1 tablespoon)
150g of unsalted butter, room temperature
130g of icing sugar
A pinch of salt
2 egg yolks
Granulated sugar, as needed
1 egg white beaten

What you will need:
Cling film
A baking tray, lined with parchment

Spatula

A mixer: handheld or standalone. Or, a husband-shaped-whisk-wielding helper to help. (Elbow grease)
Pastry brush

Wire rack

Preparation:

1. In a bowl, sieve the flour and the green tea powder together, twice. Set aside.

2. Beat the butter, icing sugar and the pinch of salt together until soft and creamy. Add the egg yolks and mix well.

3. Add the flour and green tea mixture into the bowl. Fold with a spatula.

4. Cover the dough with cling film and chill in the fridge for 15 - 20 minutes.
5. This is the time to clean your kitchen, preheat the oven to 150 degrees C, and line your baking tray with parchment.
6. Roll out the dough into a log and slice it into uniform sizes. The number of cookies you get depends on the size of your log.

7. Dip the edges of the cookies in the granulated sugar, and arrange on the baking tray.
8. Brush the egg white on the cookies with a pastry brush. It makes the cookie smooth and shiny. I made half with the egg white glaze, and half without.

9. Bake in the oven for 25 minutes.
10. Remove, then cool on the wire rack before serving.