Disclaimer!!! This is a crispy cookie and it’s got tahini in it…a lot of tahini.
If you are still reading, then you’ve got to be sesame crazy like me! It’s not everyone’s cup of tea when it comes to this much sesame and tahini. A lot of people don’t mind the sesame in a stir-fry but that’s it. Due to it’s distinct taste and overpowering quality tahini and sesame oil are used with caution in cooking and baking.
We make a large variety of sweets for our New Year celebrations in Sri Lanka, where I grew-up. Though I haven’t done that in years, I still relive those moments . I was a massive fan of these celebrations, all because we get to make and eat sweets.
One of my favorite things to make was the Sesame balls. This uses toasted sesame, coconut, coconut palm sugar (jaggery) and this was a flavor bomb! which got me thinking, that, I haven’t tried making it yet (it require a stone mortar and a pestle… rather a large one, not sure what to substitute this with..) If I did, I will have to share the recipe, it is so yummy!
This cookie takes me back to those days. That’s why I love this so much. If you are a lover of all things sesame, then this recipe is for you.
I love to experiment with my food. You can safely say that this is a mashup of a Brown sugar cookie and a tahini cookie. Tahini was new to me and it was love at first sight. I use it in several dishes from stir-fries to cakes. It is something you can’t eat on it’s own, cos of the bitter after taste, but works like magic when added to something.
This is the easiest cookie recipe ever ( okay may be one of the easiest) You can really mix everything in one bowl and bake them straight away and enjoy. The whole process won’t take more than 25 minutes from measuring ingredients to actually eating a baked cookie. No need to chill the dough!
One important thing, make sure you stir the Tahini before you pour it out!. Natural tahini, tend to separate and if you don’t stir, chances are you will only be using the oils (the liquid part) leaving the solids at the bottom of the jar. We don’t want this!
This cookie is great with tea or coffee and you can actually dunk this as it is crispy and would hold it’s shape. Great with a glass of milk before bed too.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 1 tsp bi carbonate of soda (baking soda)
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup dark brown sugar (lightly packed)
- 1/2 cup coconut palm sugar
- 1/2 cup butter (1 stick) at room temperature
- 1 small egg at room temperature
- 1/2 cups tahini
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- about 1/2 cup sesame (raw, not toasted) to coat
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375 F
- In a bowl of a stand mixer, beat butter with brown sugar and coconut sugar until combined. It should look like a paste
- Add the egg followed by tahini, vanilla and blend to combine
- Mix flour, baking soda and salt in a separate bowl and add to the above mix
- Beat/mix on slow speed until everything combines together to form a nice dough
- This dough is not sticky, you should be able to form a ball easily by hand
- Prepare a baking sheet or two lined with parchment paper
- Spread the row sesame on a flat plate
- Take a table spoon of dough, squash it and roll between the two palms to form a ball
- place the dough ball on the sesame and press lightly. Check the photo in the post
- Place the cookie on a tray, sesame coated side up
- Bake for 15 minutes
- * it is always a good idea to bake a tester cookie, just to make sure the oven temperature is right and the cookie comes out the way you like! Depending on the tester, you can tweak the cookie size and the oven temp.
- Cool on a wire rack before storing
- Store in an air-tight container
2 comments
I made this with crunchy peanut butter because I was out of tahini. I also used a large egg instead of a small one. I really like them! They are crispy and dry, perfect with coffee or tea.
Awesome 🙂 Nice choice of substitute!