Wholewheat Ragi Chocolate biscuits (No Baking soda and No Baking powder)

Hi friends !! Here's wishing all the mothers a very Happy Mother's Day!! Now, coming to my motherhood trauma.....like any other kid, my girl is currently going through a "biscuits-phase"....a phase where all she wants to hog on is, chocolate biscuits whole day. Now being a mommy, it is obviously not acceptable to me...but "No" is unacceptable to her too. So, I have tried making it a bit healthier,  by using wholewheat flour and ragi flour. We as adults loved it too and there was a duel between the daddy-daughter duo for the last biscuit. Needless to say I had to bake a fresh batch that very night to resolve their fight. The nuttiness of the flours added depth to the chocolate flavor, making it more intense and yummier. These biscuits are crisp and buttery.....

Irresistible and addictive are the only words I can choose to describe them...

Yield: 20-25 biscuits 

Pre-preparation: 1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F;

2. Line your cookie tray with parchment paper (don't grease).

Ingredients:

120 gm Unsalted butter, slightly colder than room-temperature 

140 gm Icing sugar 

135 gm Wholewheat Flour 

40 gm Ragi flour 

1 medium Egg (For egg substitution, see TIPS below)

1 tsp Vanilla extract 

3.5 Tbsp Cocoa powder 

A pinch of salt

Method:

1. Sift together the 2 flours, salt and cocoa powder 2-3 times.

2. Beat together butter, vanilla extract and sugar till really light and fluffy. Beating incorporates air in the dough making the biscuits light n fluffy even without Baking Powder and soda, so don't skip it or rush it.

3. Add in egg in the butter-mix and beat till fully incorporated. 

4. Add in the flour mix and with the help of a spatula fold it in, till it all starts leaving the sides of the bowl and coming together. The batter will be sticky and unlike a regular dough. It will be like a very very thick and doughy cake batter.

5. Scoop out 1 Tbsp dough, roll it between your palms and put it on cookie tray, flatten it slightly.  Repeat the same with the whole dough. If you find the dough becoming difficult to handle due to warm weather, just pop it in the fridge for 15 minutes and you'll be able to roll it nicely. 

6. Place your cookie tray in freezer for 25 minutes (in hot weather; 15 minutes in cold weather).

7. Place the tray in the oven and bake at 180°C/350°F (160°C/320°F if you have fan-oven) for 15 minutes. If the biscuits are soft to touch in centre but have set at the edges, then take the cookie tray out but leave the biscuits on the tray. They will harden after 15-20 minutes. Each oven is different and you know your oven better, so use your discretion regarding the temperature and time. 

7. If you want to roll and cut, then plop the dough on wrapping film and using your hands, shape it into a log. Chill the log for 20 minutes and then slice it into biscuits. The slice shouldn't be thicker than 0.8 cm. The thicker the slice, the longer it will take to cook and yet be soft in the middle. So if you want crisp biscuits, don't slice them thick.

8. Store them in an air-tight container when they have cooled completely.

TIPS:
1. If you don't want to use egg, skip it and just use 2 Tbsp cold milk in its place. It works perfectly fine. Egg here is used mainly for binding. The texture of the biscuit depends on the creaming of butter-sugar, hence don't skip beating butter till light n fluffy. Following is a pic of the eggless version I make using milk:

2. The amount of flour given above is perfect in respect to the amount of butter and other ingredients used in the recipe. Please don't be tempted to use more flour as it will make ur biscuit dense and hard. If the dough becomes difficult to handle due to heat, just keep it in the fridge for 15-20 minutes.
3. Freezing the biscuits before baking is critical to ensure they don't loose their shape on baking. Please don't skip it.

Tkcr...till next time...byeee!!