Lucy Corkhill

By Lucy Corkhill

30th December 2013

Making fortune cookies is a lovely way to wish friends and family a great new year. Invite everyone round for drinks and nibbles and wheel these out at midnight – magic! They’re a bit fiddly to make so you might want to do a dummy run to get the hang of it. The best bit is thinking up fortunes to place inside them. Make sure everyone gets a nice fortune, obviously, and think generic fortunes that suit people equally. Fortunes might include a prosperous new year, good health, achievement of a personal goal, peace and tranquillity. Or you might prefer to write a personal fortune for each guest – just make sure they are placed in front of the right people!

Lucy Corkhill

By Lucy Corkhill

30th December 2013

Lucy Corkhill

By Lucy Corkhill

30th December 2013

Fortune Cookie Ingredients: 115g plain flour 115g granulated sugar 3 tbls vegetable oil The whites of 2 large eggs ½ tsp vanilla extract ½ tsp almond extract 1.5 tsps cornstarch Pinch of salt 3 tsps water

You’ll also need a baking sheet tray, sometimes called a cookie sheet.

How to make them:
1. Prepare your fortunes by writing them on small strips of paper and folding them.
2. Preheat oven to 150 C/300 F/Gas mark 2. Grease your baking sheet really well. Write fortunes on strips of paper about 4 inches long and 1/2 inch wide.
3. Whisk the egg whites with the vanilla extract, almond extract and vegetable oil until foamy but not stiff.
4. In a separate bowl, sift the flour, salt, cornstarch and sugar together, before blending into the egg white mixture with the water. Stir until you have a nice batter.
5. Carefully spoon out the batter onto the baking sheet. It’s a little like making a pancake as you’ll need to tilt the sheet from side to side to make a circle of batter about 3 inches wide. Make sure there’s plenty of space between the circles.
6. You only need to pop them in the oven for about 5 minutes, or until they start to lightly brown around the edges.
7. Once you’ve removed the cookies from the oven, you need to act fast! Once the cookies have hardened, you can’t fold them so it is best to make just a few cookies at a time. Lift the cookie with a spatula and place upside down on a chopping board. Put one of the folded pieces of paper with a fortune on it in the centre of the cookie. Fold the cookie in half. Place the cookie on the rim of a glass and gently pull the edges down over the rim, then place the cookie in a muffin case so that it keeps its shape as it firms.
8. Start making your next batch of cookies; make several at a time until you have the knack.

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