I saw Dani make these grissini at her cooking class in Melbourne a few weeks ago. They looked pretty fuss free, and they really are pretty simple to make. Dani mentioned at the class that your imagination is really your only limit to what you could flavour these grissini with. Today I did the Apricot and Cardamom as per the recipe, but I’m thinking I might try cranberry, fig, mango, or a marmalade-ish mix next time I’m in the mood for something sweet, or maybe even try a savoury kind – parmesan, lemon zest, cheese and chive or something like that. I’ll keep my eye out at the supermarket for some inspiration!
You don’t use much cardamom for this recipe, and I’m a bit of a fan of it, so next time I’ll up the cardamom seed amount.
You need to let the jam cool before you spread it out onto the dough – but it shouldn’t be a problem as you have to wait for the dough to prove anyway. I think my jam was actually a little too thick and I ended up using my fingers to spread it out all over the dough before folding it over. Make sure you go completely to the edge with the jam, otherwise you’ll end up with grissini without any of the beautiful apricot and cardamom paste.
I purposely made this batch with a minimum of equipment, I used the thermomix spatula as a knife to cut the dough into strips, but if you were after a prettier finish, you could move the proved dough from the thermomat onto a floured surface and use a sharp knife. Not sure if it was the fact that I only had 100 grams of poppy seed and not the 120 as the recipe called for (a tip for young players – the bag of poppy seeds I bought a few weeks ago was only 100 grams, so you’ll need 2!!) – but my dough was a little wet. I could have added more flour, but I didn’t. As it was a little wet and sticky, I kept it on the thermomat, so the presentation is a little rustic.
The apricot and cardamom jam is so easy to make. Jam making is one of the joys of owning a thermomix I think – not that i make a lot of jam by any stretch, but really, how many people do you know what would make 200 grams of jam just for the hell of it? Well, with a thermomix, you can – in minutes.
I was in a hurry to get these bad boys cooked, so in spite of my better judgement, I put three trays of them in the oven at once. Not good!! I scorched the top tray a little, so ended up having to shuffle them around a little. It also doesn’t help that I’m not a huge fan of my oven, and I’m getting to the stage where I think I might have to pull the pin and treat myself to a better one. We left the best oven at our last house, and there’s not a day that goes by that I don’t miss it! Mine were a little too long – I think as a result of the very stretchy wet dough, so next time I’ll make sure I use the right amount of poppy seeds and maybe add a little more bakers flour.
If your oven has some hot spots, then make sure you check these regularly as they do go from pale and interesting to bad fake tan colour very quickly!
I’ll be brining these to my sister’s house tomorrow for farewell drinks for her son as he heads off overseas for an extended holiday. I’m sure we’ll enjoy a few of these with a glass of bubbles!
In the Mix Tricks 