Addison Embroidery
at the
Vicarage

Chocolate and almond thumbprint cookies with white chocolate centres

I have yet to get back into the routine of baking biscuits for church on Sundays and this is my first effort since Christmas. The red spotty plate gives the biscuits a touch of Christmas, which is now long over and done with, but what with the recent torrential rain and the disruption this has caused to transport in and out of Oxford, I feel a splash of red is only too welcome. Dark days call for dark chocolate which gives the cookies a depth of flavour that complements (and even compliments) the ground nuts.

Ingredients

225 g/ 8oz softened butter

140 g/5oz caster sugar

1 egg yolk, lightly beaten 

2 tsp vanilla extract

11o g/ 4 oz plain flour

11o g / 4 oz wholemeal flour

55 g  / 2oz cocoa powder

55 g/ 2 oz ground almonds (or  ground hazelnuts)

55g/ 2 oz plain chocolate chips

5o g / 1 3/4 oz white chocolate

Preheat oven to 190 degrees C/ 170 degrees C fan oven/375 degrees F/ Gas Mark 5.

Line 3 large baking sheets with baking parchment or wipe with Cake Release emulsion.

Beat softened butter and sugar until light and fluffy, then add the beaten egg yolk along with the vanilla extract. Next sift flour and cocoa into the mixture and then mix in the ground almonds and chocolate chips. 

Take teaspoonfuls of the mixture, roll into balls and place on the baking tray. With your finger or the end of a wooden spoon make an indention in the middle of each ball and flatten it slightly. Bake in the preheated oven for 12-15 minutes.

When removed from the oven, press gently the indention made previously as it will have risen during cooking. Leave to stand on the tray for a couple of minutes, then remove with a spatula and put to cool on a wire rack. When completely cool put some melted white chocolate in the hollow.

These are deliciously short and melt on the tongue. I used white chocolate in the centre as I had to carry the biscuits to church. If eaten at home a softer centre of buttercream or Nutella might be good. A topping of half a glacé Morello cherry would also be a good foil for the dark chocolate.

Vietnamese purse in reverse appliqué embroidery

I mentioned reverse appliqué decoration in my posts on Vietnamese  skirts and afterwards I remembered that when daughter No 2 spent her gap year inVietnam 15 years ago she had brought back several simple little zipped purses decorated in this way. I had an idea where one of these purses was and once I’d picked off the dead moth cases I was relieved to find the decoration hadn’t been damaged. Somewhere we have more purses – they seemed too delicate to use for destructive contents like dirty heavy loose change – I dare say they’ll turn up some time – when they do I think I’ll frame them. Today it’s not so easy to find ones like this with cotton appliqué on a hemp substrate. And for all its lack of careful conservation and moth infestation, the sewing on this purse is perfect with not a whisker of escaped frayed thread.

Vietnamese reverse appliqué (from Catherine Legrand’s ‘Textiles: A World Tour’ T&H 2008)

Curiously, there are two tribes that excel at this style of embroidery and have made it their own. Even more curious is the fact that they are half a world apart. The Kuna women on the Atlantic coast of Panama use this technique to decorate blouses, called molas. The Hmong peoples from mountainous Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam also use it on clothing as well as on bed covers, tablecloths, cushions, etc. They call it ‘pa nadu’ which means ‘flower cloths’. There is an unwritten tradition (possibly apocryphal) that Hmong reverse appliqué conceals the script of their lost ancient language, transcribed into textile form when their culture was under threat. Sadly, lost too is the ability to interpret these symbols which include steps, spirals, labyrinths and chequerboards.

Kuna reverse appliqué (from Catherine Legrand’s book ‘Textiles: A World Tour’ T&H, 2008)

The technique (in words) is simple and involves 2 (or more) pieces of fabric placed one on top of the other and tacked together. A design is then cut out of the top layer to reveal the fabric beneath. The raw edges of the top fabric are then tucked under and slip stitched to the bottom fabric – a deceptive description for a technique that requires skill or much practice to produce a clean  neat edge  devoid of straggly fraying threads. When I’ve tried to do something similar I’ve found it fraught with tension as I usually lost the battle to keep the curve smooth and strong and the  raw edge tucked firmly under. The thought of using such decoration on anything in regular use has me speechless. From the photographs the stylistic differences of the Hmong and Kuna embroidery is clear.