that’s so miss universe

I’m guessing I’m probably the last member of the foodblogosphere to try out Pierre Hermes’s Korova cookies aka World Peace Cookies. I honestly have no idea what was holding me back, since almost every one of the admirable foodbloggers have attested to its divine indulgence. So yesterday (and today) was spent mulling over them.

Anyone familiar with the aforementioned cookies would, at first glance, realise something different from the photo I’ve posted. Any guesses? Well, they aren’t exactly the picture-perfect smooth chocolate rounds that they were meant to be. I was supposed to cut them into slices after having formed the dough into logs, but as luck were to have it, even after leaving them overnight in the fridge, the logs were still crumbly. And I’m not talking about we-can-just-piece-them-together crumbly, but as in these-look-like-grains-of-sand type of crumbly. I suspect it’s got to do with the step where I add in the flour. Maybe I didn’t mix enough, all thanks to the trepidations raised by the constant emphasis of not overworking the dough. So I just had to stick to the routine hand-shaping method as a last resort.

the other route

I don’t drink milk. The closest I would probably come to milk would be reading the label ‘Milk Chocolate’ off a sinful package of much-needed daily dose of cocoa-laden happy pills. Mmmmhmmm… So when people talk of drawing on childhood nostalgia dunking bite-sized cookies in a tall glass of milk, I’d probably be the only one in the room with a different childhood altogether.

I don’t drink coffee. The closest I would probably come to coffee would be hanging out at Coffee Bean, engaging in the sinful delight of its Boston Nut Brownie. Mmmmhmmm… So when people talk of having the best afternoons dunking perfect biscottis in the depths of their coffee cups, I have to admit that I don’t have the faintest idea what that would taste like.

But I still like dunking food in my drinks. More specifically, biscuits in my cup of tea or Milo. And as of yesterday, I’ve introduced a new dunkee (?) in my cup, the oft-mentioned one in the caffeinated world, ie biscotti.

and they were all yellow

Inspired by Patricia’s lime meringue muffins, I decided to embark on a citrus journey through the kitchen today. That, along with the fact that I had about ten egg whites to spare after baking the tarts, and the only word that comes to mind is m-e-r-i-n-g-u-e.

Put citrus and meringue together, and what do you get?

My very first lemon cupcakes with meringue.