RED BEANS AND FIGS FOURRÈ COOKIES
(for about 60 cookies)
INGREDIENTS:
- 80g of soaked Amìo’s red beans (about 30g if dry)
- 200g of dried figs
- 250g of butter
- 500g of flour
- 100g of sugar
- 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon of baking powder
- 2 pinches of salt
PROCEDURE
- The night before the preparation, soak the red beans in cold water for 12 hours, then rinse them under tap water and put them in a pot with about ½ liter of water for every 100g of product, bring to the boil before covering and simmer for 50/55 minutes, salting at the end only, with a teaspoon of rock salt to make them softer.
- Cut the dried figs in approximate pieces and put them in the mixer with the baked beans and the cinnamon, then blend until you get a dough. Pour this dough on a baking paper sheet, cover it with another sheet and flatten it with a rolling pin, to get a 25 x 12 x 0,5 cm rectangle. Put in the fridge.
- Now prepare the cookies dough.
In a bowl, mix the flour, the sugar, the salt and the baking powder. Add the butter in pieces and pound the dough with the fingertips, crumbling the dough. Add 5/6 spoons of water to get a kneadable paste and make a ball, cover with some food-quality film and put in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes. - Take the dough, which now is cold, and flatten it between two baking paper sheets to get a square shape, which you will then split in 6 cm width stripes.
- Take the beans and figs paste and get some 1 cm width stripes out of it, which will be put in the center of each dough stripe, then fold by leaving the joint at the bottom and press firmly to seal.
- Cut some cookies of nearly 3 cm and decorate the surface by using the spike of a fork.
- Arrange the cookies on a plate with some baking paper and bake at 180° C for about 15 minutes.
- Let the cookies cool on a grill and, when they’ll be cold, sprinkle some powdered sugar on them.
Have you ever thought about preparing some cookies by using legumes as ingredients? Dried legumes are so versatile that they’re ideal for multiple preparations, even sweet ones!
While I was making these cookies, I was pretty curious to taste them, I couldn’t wait for them to be done to savour and understand if the ingredients combination I’ve created could work… with my great joy I can say yes!
The results were very satisfying, some really excellent, fragrant and tasty cookies, in which the sweetness of figs gets exalted by the soft taste of these red beans, which are pretty suitable for a main role even in sweet recipes.
I love making cookies, kneading, cutting them and then watch them “come alive” in the oven…every time I’m so happy that I can’t wait for them to get cold, so I inevitably taste a few ones when they’re not piping hot yet. I love the smell of the butter spreading all over my house and knowing that the next day, at morning, a delicious breakfast will just be waiting for me.
I like kitchens where you actually cook, where the flour flatters around and the oven is always on!
I love thinking that my baby will always have a good homemade snack and crisp cookies to bring at school, and I love simple and quick recipes like this one, great even for those who don’t have much time to spend in the kitchen.
Beatrice, Italian with a French heart, author of the blog Crème de Cassis, I write about food and I take pictures of it.
Vegetarian for ages, a sweet tooth through and through, I talk about meat-free recipes, getting my inspiration from ingredients and gastronomic cultures.
As a good vegetarian, legumes are at the base of my diet, I love to cook them, eat them, and show their full potential.
When I'm not in the kitchen or behind the camera I'm a mother and educator, trying to combine passion and work to the fullest.
