Espresso and Praline Sandwich Cookies.

I am starting work in two days. 

Normally that wouldn't bother me, but now I have absolutely no idea of my working schedule, no idea what time to show up, no idea what to bring and also no heating element in my room. Seriously, it's cold in there. Oh, and I have no wifi. Damn.

I am back in school campus in a room that is not my own as I type this. It feels good to have wifi again - not that I don't have it at all, I just have to depend on my little mobile phone and it's mobile data. Which makes youtube surfing a pain in the ass but then again, I'm cheap. I also spent a lot of money on my recent gallant around Europe so I think I can afford to skimp for now. My wallet is bleeding.

I made oreo truffles the other day in my new room. Or home. More accurately, my room that is now my home. They turned out ok I think, other than the fact that they were held together by peanut butter instead of cream cheese. Am I going to tell you about them today ? No. But I liked them. Or maybe it's just me.

I had a special guest pop over and make arancini as well. Which technically is more of an accomplishment since it requires stock and cooking and chilling and breading and frying as opposed to my truffles which just needed to be rolled and dipped but I have an unabashed sweet tooth and way too much chocolate sitting around so I needed to do something with them before I ate them (and so I made chocolate truffles and ate them anyway. Hey, I never said I was smart). Anyhoo, am I going to tell you about the arancini then ? No. But they were good. Damn good. And they had cheese in them. Mushroom risotto ? Stuffed with cheese and fried ? Good god, need I say more ?

So what am I going to tell you about ?

Coffee cookies. With praline filling.

I made this alongside my peanut butter and jelly cookies that I posted about recently. I wasn't supposed to be making anything out of syllabus but then I was thinking of my dad and how he loved anything coffee flavoured. And then I thought of my mum and how she didn't like anything coffee flavoured. But I remembered she did like nuts and then I saw praline paste which techically was a nut sometime ago and then I decided to put them both together in yet another sandwich cookie. Because why not.

So I mixed and rolled and cut and baked.

And broke some. 

And cobbled together a filling of praline paste of which I shall attempt to give measurements of later.

And then I piped and matched.

And piped.

And matched.

Until I got tired and decided to take photos instead. Then I ate them.

Espresso Shortbreads:

Recipe adapted from here.

I basically just followed the recipe to a T. Except I didn't put in any cardamom and I used coffee extract instead of grounds. I also used a fluted cutter because I was feeling particularly flowery.

As for the filing, I creamed 80g of butter with 40g icing sugar, then I added in around 20g of praline paste. I don't remember the exact measurements so feel free to tweak this to your liking - more praline paste if you want, but know that this will make the icing really soft and difficult to pipe. You can add more icing sugar to stiffen it up but then it'll be on the sweeter side. The trick is to find a delicate balance. Not sure if I got it, but then they were some good cookies.