Old friends and some matcha sablés

Minhua, otherwise affectionately known as "Mua" and Tze Siew, otherwise termed "Siew" or "Siew Siew" have been friends with me for a very very long time. I can proudly say I've known Mua for 17 years, and Siew for 15 years, with us being the ripe ol' age of 23 this year. My my. That's a pretty amazing feat.

The last time Mua was back, it was during the summer hols, and in between her jetting off to other places for holidays, we did managed to catch up a coupla times for Korean food, ice-cream at Udders, and not forgetting a steamboat session during the CNY period at Siew's place.

It was our last meeting before she flew back to Canberra, and I wanted to make her something green tea-ish as she mentioned before that she liked matcha. But due to time constraint, I couldn't do anything nicer like a green tea cake, or green tea macarons. So I settled on a matcha recipe I saw previously on one of my favourite food blog, for matcha sablés.

Matcha powder; Matcha sablés

Green specks of matcha powder

Sugar crystals adorning the sides; Crumbs

As I wasn't sure if the shortbread would be nice, I halved the recipe and made only one log of cookies. After slicing the log into rounds and rolling the sides in castor sugar, the recipe asked to brush a layer of egg white before baking. I advise against it. When I did it for the first batch of shortbread (which sadly took up around three-quarters of my precious log), they turned out brown on the top and tasted very much like home-made cookies (I mean doh, I know it's home-made, but it's a very distinctive home-made taste, unlike any buttery shortbread I've ever tasted). So I decided to leave out the egg white brushing for the (sadly) few cookies left for the second round in the oven. Presto! Instant magic transformation. The resulting cookies were a light shade of green and has a better fragrance and taste than the first batch. Sigh. I tried to salvage the first batch by sprinkling matcha powder liberally to mask the brownish appearance and home-made taste.

I packed them into a container and brought it over to have as a sweet snack after our steamboat session. The two girls also prefered the second batch after sampling both versions. Can't blame them. There was a significant difference between the two. Haha. The above photographs taken were of the second batch (of course, why would I want to photograph the other??) of shortbread. I had some leftover and stuck them into a clear cup and into the fridge. The Sister saw them and she gave the thumbs up after testing it. It's so hard to please the girl, so if she says it's okay, it's definitely okay. Haha. I will try to make it again next time if I happen to have a craving for matcha sablés as this is a pretty good version. Or who knows, I might just surf the net and try out new recipes (which I so happen to love doing). (: