Food

BEAUTIFUL FOOD DOODLES

Courtesy of Heathers Sweets and Treats. Swirly Sugar Cookies.

Since we are featuring Beautiful Doodles this week, we got excited about food doodles. Check out what we found!

SWIRLY SUGAR COOKIES

These sweet doodle cookies from Heather Sweets and Treats are a delight. While she started with a classic sugar cookie recipe, she made it her own with her fancy doodle decorations. She’s got a nice spin on royal icing as well. If you check out her site, she’ll give you tips on how to make the best icing doodles.

Swirly Sugar Cookies

Ingredients:

For the Cookies:

3 cups flour-sifted
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
1 cup butter at room temperature
1 egg
3 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

For the Icing:

2 pounds powdered sugar (about 8 cups)
10-12 tablespoons water
6 tablespoons meringue powder
2 tablespoons flavoring such as vanilla if desired

Directions:

For the Cookies:

Put flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. Cut in softened butter with a pastry blender until the particles are fine.
After the butter is mixed in, add the egg, milk, and vanilla. Mix thoroughly. Refrigerate for at least one hour or up to three days.
Roll out the dough on a floured surface until it's 1/8 inch thick. Cut into shapes as desired.
Bake at 400 degrees for 5-8 minutes.
Cool completely.
Frost with a mixture of 2 cups powdered sugar, 1 tablespoon vanilla and 5-6 tablespoons milk.

For the Icing:

Put the powdered sugar, meringue powder, and water in a bowl.
With the whisk attachment of the mixer, gently start mixing the frosting. Mix on low to medium speed for 7 minutes.
The frosting will look a little funky for a bit, but at the end of the 7 minutes, it will come together as a smooth icing.
The icing will be fairly thick at this point. Add food coloring if desired.
The black food coloring takes some time to mix in and become the correct color. Gradually thin the icing one tablespoon at a time until the desired consistency is reached.

GEOMETRIC HENNA MEHNDI CAKE

Henna designs are basically like beautiful doodles. Usually, they are applied to skin. (Check out our post this coming Saturday for some gorgeous examples).

But Bollycakes, based in Manchester, UK, has taken henna one step further and has created a set of incredibly gorgeous Henna Mehndi Cakes.

The Henna cakes are adorned with doodles in a rainbow of colors, plus gold and silver for extra embellishment. You can customize your own color combinations and include a personalized message.

Usmaa Choudry founded Bollycakes in 2009 after practicing as a professional henna artist for several years. After she took a course in cake decoration, she found her new passion. They are the most beautiful doodle cakes we’ve ever seen!

CHEESE DOODLES

Of course, the first food that came to mind as we were thinking about doodles is

Cheez Doodles.

Like most commercial snacks, they are kinda junky (high calorie, low nutritional value, neon-colored, MSG, etc.). Not to worry though. We found some delicious homemade cheese doodles recipes. Easy, peasy, and cheesy!

This simple recipe from Sage, of 365 Foods, is light years away from store-bought. You can use either white or orange cheddar powder.

365 Foods Homemade Cheese Doodles

Ingredients:

1/3 C regular corn flour (not Masa Harina)
⅓ C finely ground cornmeal
1 Tbsp. of sharp cheddar cheese powder
1/8 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
3 Tbsp. club soda

Directions:

1. Blend dry ingredients well.

2. Add club soda and mix it into a thick paste.

3. Place mixture in piping bag and pipe out into doodle shapes.

4. Deep fry until crisp.

5. While still hot, toss the doodles in additional cheese powder.

Casey Barber nailed her own homemade version fo the cheese doodle in her new book, Classic Snacks Made from Scratch. They aren’t super-close to the original, but they are light, flaky, and super-delicious. They are simply baked, so they are a little lighter on the tongue and the waistline as well.

When Serious Eats reviewed these, they suggested using sharper cheddar and increasing the cornmeal to flour ratio. We concur. So we adapted the recipe below accordingly.

Cheese Curls (AKA CHEESE DOODLES)

Ingredients:

For Cheese Curls:

4 tablespoons (2 ounces) chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
3/4 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
¼ cup teaspoons yellow cornmeal
4 ounces extra-sharp cheddar cheese, finely shredded (about 1 cup)

For Cheese Coating:

2 tablespoons Cheddar cheese powder
1/2 teaspoon buttermilk powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon cornstarch

Directions:

To Make the Cheese Curls:

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter, salt, and garlic powder at medium-low speed for 1 to 2 minutes.
Scrape down the sides of the bowl and add the flour, cornmeal, and shredded cheese.
Stir together at low speed until a firm dough forms. Shape into a disc and place on a large sheet of plastic wrap; wrap tightly and refrigerate for 1 hour.
Preheat the oven to 350˚F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper or Silpat liners. Pinch off small pieces of the chilled dough and gently roll between your palms and fingers to form lumpy logs roughly 2 to 2 1/2 inches long and 1/4 to 1/2 inch across.
Place on the prepared baking sheets—you can space them fairly close together because they won’t puff up while baking.
Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, until the pieces are no longer shiny and are just beginning to brown around the edges.
Transfer to a wire rack and let cool completely.

To Make the Cheese Coating

Place the cheese powder, buttermilk powder, salt, and cornstarch in a spice grinder or mini food processor and whir for 10 to 15 seconds to blend evenly.
Transfer to a large zip-top bag. Add the cooled cheese doodles, seal, and shake gently to coat evenly. Store the coated cheese curls at room temperature in an airtight container for up to a week.

In addition to the Cheese Doodles, as you can see on the cover of Barber’s book, "Classic Snacks Made from Scratch: 70 Homemade Versions of Your Favorite Brand-Name Treats," doodles were a popular fun food theme back in the 50’s, when a lot of these junk food favorites were invented. Check out the doodle motif atop her version of the doodle-topped Hostess Chocolate Cupcake. It looks authentic, but tastes way, way, way, better!

Classic Snacks Made From Scratch: 70 Homemade Versions of Your Favorite Brand Name Treats, by Casey Barber

Ulysses Press (2013)

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Read more about Beautiful Doodles, as it relates to Arts/Design, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Place/Time, Mind/Body, and Soul/Impact, including Cool Collaborative Doodling Now, and The Nature and Science of Doodles.