Sometimes, a girl just needs to bake cookies. Food stylist Karen Shinto and I had a phone meeting recently to sketch out a game plan for an upcoming Asian Tofu photo shoot. After we got all of our work squared away, we chatted about recent food discoveries. One of the things that she mentioned was making a batch of tasty Chinese-style peanut cookies.

Did I want the recipe? Of course! My momma didn’t raise no fool. Karen also sent along these photos too! What a friend.

These cookies came about because Karen had a bunch of peanuts sitting around. Wondering how to use them up, she remembered a short (that’s not a slight on height) Chinese cookie from her youth.

You may be familiar with these Chinese peanut cookies as a Lunar New Year sweet. Hua sheng bing are often sold in tall plastic containers at the markets. I assure you that homemade ones taste far better.

Karen couldn’t wait till CNY to have her cookies. She looked them up online, rummaged through her books, and tinkered in her kitchen to come up with this recipe for Chinese peanut cookies.

After getting her recipe, I thawed my stash of unsalted, roasted peanuts and made some. Wow. They were full of peanut goodness. Karen’s Chinese peanut cookies were rich and lardy tasting but there was no lard. Ground peanuts, cooking oil, and butter enriched the dough. The confectioner’s (powdered) sugar added to the crumbly texture.Karen used canola but I opted for semi-refined peanut oil that I get at the Chinese market. That type of peanut oil adds a lovely roasty peanut taste and perfume. The cookies came together very quickly.  My dough was softer than the one that Karen made (see the photos below). I made two batches while pozole simmered on the stove for dinner!

These peanut cookies have little cracks on the outside. Karen was concerned about the cracks because they didn’t jive with her childhood memory. I tried cutting down the baking powder to 1/2 teaspoon but the cookies still cracked. I think they’re quite lovely and leaving them as is. They add character and evoke the delicate richness of the cookie. Thanks, Shinto, for the cookies!

RECIPE

Chinese Peanut Cookies
Hua Sheng Bing

Karen said that these cookies are best the next day. I ate them a few hours after pulling them from the oven because I could not wait. They were spectacular. I saved half of the dough in the fridge to bake more later. Don’t try to make the dough entirely in the processor as it gets over mixed and prone to becoming oily too easily.

Makes 48 to 60 cookies

2 cups plus 2 tablespoons unsalted, roasted peanuts
1 1/4 cups confectioner’s sugar
10 3/4 ounces (2 cups plus 2 tablespoons) all-purpose flour, bleached or unbleached
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
2/3 cup fragrant peanut or canola oil
1 egg, beaten

1. Position a rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 325F degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment.

2. Put the peanuts in a food processor and grind into the texture of coarse crumbs. Add the powdered sugar and process until there is a mixture of fine crumbs and powder, stopping to scrape the bottom of the bowl if needed. Do not over process or you’ll end up with peanut butter.

3. In a large bowl, combine the flour, salt, and baking powder. Dump the peanut mixture into bowl and stir until well combined.

4. Drizzle melted butter and the oil into the bowl. Use your hands to mix and knead the ingredients to form soft dough. It will soften as you knead it. The dough texture feel a bit like coarse play dough. If the dough becomes too soft to handle and feels oily, refrigerate the dough for 15 minutes to firm up. If the dough feels dry, add oil by the tablespoon.

5. Roll the dough into 1-inch balls and put them on the baking sheets, spaced 1 1/2 inches apart. If you like, put a little decorative stamp on top. I used the top of a clean and dry Sharpie pen cap!

6. Brush the tops with lightly with beaten egg, then bake for 20-22 minutes until light golden in color. Transfer to racks and let cool completely before eating or storing in an airtight container. These cookies are very delicate and can smudge easily. Be gentle with them.

I’ve posted several times about Vietnamese banh mi but realized that I’d never presented a full-fledged, master recipe,  nor have I provided some history about the popular Vietnamese snack.  First off, a bit about sandwiches themselves. Thank heavens for John Montagu (1718-1792), 4th Earl of Sandwich, who habitually sent for cold meat in between two slices of bread so that he wouldn’t have to break away from the gambling tables to eat. Little did he know how he’d impact global eating practices, let alone that of a small country like Vietnam!

There is essentially one sandwich in Vietnamese cooking and it is quite a tour de force. It started out very simply, with baguette smeared with liver pate and that was it. That’s how my mom knew it in the 1940s when she was growing up in Northern Vietnam. What we know today as banh mi is a light, crispy small baguette that is split and hollowed before it is invariably filled with homemade mayonnaise or butter (which I don’t like), sliced chili pepper, cilantro leaves, cucumber, a tangy-sweet daikon and carrot pickle (do chua), and a drizzle of soy sauce. The variation comes in when you choose what protein component(s) will be center stage. The classic version, banh mi thit nguoi—referred to as the “special” (dac biet) at Vietnamese delis, includes a smearing of housemade liver pâté and thin slices of various Vietnamese cold cuts. Other filling options include, but are not limited to, roasted chicken, grilled pork, crunchy julienned pork skin (bì), Chinese char siu pork, and tofu. This delicious, fanciful version was popularized by Southern Vietnamese, particularly those in Saigon, and is what we know abroad today and in most of Vietnam too.

In the early 1980s, these sandwiches occupied the food craze spotlight in the Vietnamese-American community. A sandwich war of sorts ensued in Little Saigon, California, where entrepreneurial deli owners posted banners advertising low prices ($1 or $1.25) and special offers like “Buy 2 Get 1 Free”. Word spread about who had the best deal and best product. There were light-hearted squabbles over which deli should have your loyalty. Our family, like other folks who can’t resist a good bargain, bought a dozen sandwiches at a time—veggies on the side so that the bread wouldn’t get soggy on the way home. After eating and analyzing a fair number of so-so sandwiches (you eventually get what you pay for), we started making them ourselves—the genesis of this banh mi recipe.

 

The Bread and Protein
Light crispy baguette (not the chewy rustic kind) is essential for encasing without overshadowing the other ingredients. Vietnamese baguette is commonly made with rice and wheat flour, which makes for an airy crumb. You can purchase the baguette at Vietnamese or Chinese markets, Vietnamese bakeries and delis, or make your own Vietnamese baguette. A Mexican bolillo roll works well too. So does regular baguette, though avoid sourdough and the overly crusty type.

The focal point may be leftover grilled or roasted meat, thin slices of Vietnamese steamed pâté (gio lua), or even seared tofu.  Yes, purchased chicken liver pate, even German braunschweiger, can be smeared into a banh mi! Because the daikon and carrot pickle can keep for days in the fridge, you can make banh mi whenever the spirit moves you.

Banh Mi Sandwich

For each sandwich:

1 petit baguette roll or a 7-inch section cut from a regular length baguette, purchased orhomemade
Mayonnaise, real (whole egg) or homemade mayonnaise
Maggi Seasoning sauce or soy sauce
Your choice of boldly-flavored meat or tofu, sliced and at room temperature
3 or 4 thin seeded cucumber strips, pickling or English variety preferred
2 or 3 cilantro sprigs, roughly chopped
3 or 4 thin jalapeño pepper slices
Everyday Daikon and Carrot Pickle (do chua)

1. Slit the bread lengthwise, and then use your fingers or a bread knife to hollow out the insides, making a trough in both halves. Discard the insides or save it for another use, such as breadcrumbs. If necessary, crisp up the bread in a toaster oven preheated to 325ºF, and then let it cool for a minute before proceeding.

2. Generously spreading the inside with mayonnaise. Drizzle in some Maggi Seasoning sauce or soy sauce. Start from the bottom portion of bread to layer in the remaining ingredients. (As with all sandwiches, you’ll eventually develop an order for layering the filling so as to maximize the interaction between flavors and textures.) Close the sandwich, cut it in half crosswise for easy eating, and enjoy.