It’s the time of the year again for some Christmas cheer.

This time, they come in the form of chocolate sables. To introduce some Christmas feel, I piped them in circles to make them look like Christmas wreaths. Then I finished them with a dusting of icing sugar for that almost romantic snowfall effect. Initially, my plan was to  to dot them with some gold and silver dragées but I ran out of these decorative sugars.

I tried to convince myself that simplicity is at times better anyway.

More importantly, these chocolate sablés are a delight; I can munch on them all day like popcorn or chips. They taste of luscious dark chocolate, the kind that dreams are made of…and they crumble into sand as soon as your teeth touches them, beautiful.

They are really easy to make. My only advice is to use the best cocoa powder that you can afford. It makes a world of difference as there is really little to distract from the flavour of the chocolate.

I sure hope that these would be a delightful addition in your Christmas baking!

xx,
Jo

Recipe: Chocolate sable Christmas wreaths
Recipe taken from Chocolate desserts by Pierre Hermé, written by Dorie Greenspan
Makes about 45 sables

Ingredients:
250g unsalted butter, room temperature
100g icing sugar, sifted
pinch of salt
3 tbsp egg whites (about 2 large egg whites), room temperature
260g plain flour
30g dutch-processed cocoa powder ( I use Valrhona)

icing sugar (For dusting, optional)

Method:
1. Cream the butter until it is pale and creamy. Add in the sugar and salt and cream at med-high speed for another 2-3 minutes.

2. Add in the egg whites and mix at medium speed.  Mixture may curdle but it will come together once you add the flour and cocoa powder.

3. In another bowl, whisk together your flour and cocoa powder. Add the flour and cocoa powder mixture into your butter mixture gradually and mix until just incoporated. You should mix it as little as you can once you add in the flour.

4. Pipe the dough with a star shaped nozzle into circle shaped cookies about 1.5 to 2 inches in diameter and space them evenly apart as the sables will spread slightly.

5.Bake the cookies in the oven for about 12-14 minutes in a 180 °C (350 °F) oven, until they are just set but are not browned or hard. Repeat with the next batch of sables. But do not pipe the cookie dough onto the hot baking trays. They will melt immediately and not stay in shape.

6. Transfer the cookies to a cooling rack to cool to room temperature before storing them in an air-tight container. Dust them with icing sugar for that wintry wonderland look.You can also decorate these wreaths with gold and silver dragées to make them look pretty.

*Storage tip: Store the cooled sables in an air-tight container and they will keep at room temperature for about a week.