Wow! Am I ever excited to do this write-up! First of all, Happy February! There are so many delicious and decadent things to bake in preparation for the most obvious of February holidays, but before we go there, let’s not forget about the holiday coming up this Tuesday: Chinese New Year! We are entering the Year of the Pig, so maybe it’s not a coincidence that I started my baking blog this year… I’m kidding, of course. My goal is to honor the Spring Festival, not misappropriate it. If you’d like to read up on some of the traditions of the holiday, here’s a link: https://chinesenewyear.net
This week, I decided to try my hand at making homemade fortune cookies! Funnily enough, I don’t really care for the fortune cookies you typically get with Chinese take-out. Even funnier, fortune cookies may have originated from Japanese cuisine and popularized in California to appeal to Americans. It’s probably a fair statement to say that fortune cookies really have nothing to do with Chinese New Year or Chinese culture in general. However, they are ridiculously fun to make, and the homemade version tastes SO much better than take out. These aren’t as tooth-breakingly hard, and they taste a bit more like a very thin sugar cookie than just…nothing. Bonus: you can write your own fortunes to put inside!
I started out with this recipe from The Semi-Sweet Sisters. This recipe takes a bit of pre-planning, because from the time you start the batter, it’s a pretty wild ride to the end. It also helps if you are doing this with a friend. Unfortunately, I was doing this all by myself while my husband kept the baby entertained!
There are a few things on the to-do list before you begin. First things first, you need the fortunes! Because I knew I’d be photographing and posting the pictures, most of mine just said “Happy Chinese New Year,” but a few of them had funny messages I found by looking online. I also stuck in a few Magic 8 Ball responses, mostly because I’m always disappointed when my Fortune Cookies just give me advice instead of telling my fortune. I also printed one that said “This cookie is never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down,” because who can resist bringing back the Rick Roll in the form of a baked good? Not this girl.
The second thing I did to prep was to figure out just how I’d get perfect, uniform 4″ circles out of this batter. I was planning on baking them on a silicone baking mat. It turns out, you can trace circles on a piece of parchment, stick it underneath the silicone mat, and Voila! You’ve got a guide map to perfect circles! After using the parchment as a guide, it easily slipped out from under the mat and was ready to use for the next round of rounds! I traced around a 29 oz can of tomato sauce I had in my pantry to make three circles. It wasn’t quite 4″ in diameter, but it was close enough!
The cookies don’t spread, so technically there’d be room for twice this amount of cookies on one tray, but you have to work very quickly when they come out of the oven. If you’re doing it by yourself, three was almost too many. If you’ve got a partner, I’d go for four, max. Any more than that, the baked cookie cools too quickly to work into the shape without cracking.
Before we get too ahead of ourselves with tips, let’s briefly go back to the mixing!
There’s nothing particularly fussy about this batter. The only special step involved is whipping the egg whites until they are nice and frothy. The whipping takes about 30 seconds to a minute of rigorous whisking. After you get the froth, add the rest of the wet ingredients and add the whole thing to the previously combined dry ingredients. Whisk it all together. Simple.
I used a tablespoon of batter for each round, and just used the back of the tablespoon to spread it out to the edges of the guides on the parchment. I was careful to measure out exact tablespoons, but I only got 15 cookies out of it. I probably could have gotten 16, but I wasn’t about to bake a whole tray for one cookie. In the future, I’ll probably use a scant tablespoon in the hopes to get all 18. Also, some of the cookies didn’t get completely crispy, and that was probably due to certain parts being a little thick. Maybe that “not quite 4 inches around” wasn’t good enough after all!
I worked the batter out to the edges in a circular motion and tried to get an even consistency. The batter is the perfect fluidity to help you out. It won’t flow past the edge you set, but it will fill in a little bit if you give it some time and a little coaxing where needed. The bake time is 8-12 minutes, but I quickly ditched the timer for visual verification. The outer edges should be nice and golden. Don’t forget to slip your stencil out from under the silicone mat before baking. I doubt it would hurt anything to leave it there, but I don’t like the idea of baking on top of ink!
Third prep tip: Have your cupcake tin handy before the cookies come out of the oven. Don’t call frantically from the kitchen for your husband to get it for you while he’s holding a baby and has no concept of the differences between a cupcake tin and a muffin tin and you are holding a fresh out of a 350F oven cookie with your bare hands. Don’t be like me. I have no fingerprints today!
From the moment you take those suckers out of the oven, you have to work as quickly as possible. They are hot, and they cool incredibly fast, making them hard to shape without cracking. I have a sweet video showing this process, but I still cannot figure out how to embed a video into the body of my blog. I’m working on it. I promise. Until then, here are a few stills showing the steps:
While the cookies cool, break into a museum and steal a priceless artifact or something, because you now have no fingerprints to leave behind. Just kidding. Don’t do that. Watch a movie about someone else doing that and prepare your chocolate and sprinkle dipping station.
I used dark chocolate and red Wilton candy melts as well as some red nonpareils and some extremely pretty gold sparkling sugar. I chose red because it’s a good luck color for Chinese New Year, and fortune cookies are sort of like little envelopes! (I hope you read the info through the link I provided so you understand this reference!)
My husband laughed at my use of the Chinese take-out containers to store the cookies in until I was able to decorate. Not a coincidence!
Burnt fingertips aside, these fortune cookies were honestly SO much fun to make. It took one round of cookies until I was able to get the technique down, but it was actually very easy. I will absolutely do these again, with or without the chocolate dipping. My intention was to bring these into work, but they didn’t make it out of my kitchen. I didn’t get to shoot the final photos until the next day, and by that time, I was missing quite a few. Also, I’m really hungry for Chinese take-out.
Happy Chinese New Year, everyone, and Happy Baking!!
Homemade Fortune Cookies
Recipe compliments of The Semi-Sweet Sisters
Ingredients
- 2 Egg Whites
- 1/2 tsp Vanilla
- 3 Tbsp Oil (I used Canola. Try with sesame or soybean!)
- 1/2 cup Cake Flour
- 1 1/2 tsp Corn Starch
- 1/2 cup Granulated Sugar
- Pinch of Salt
- 3 tsp Water
Directions
- Step 1 Print out custom fortunes on plain paper and cut them into strips (3″ x 1/4″ works well, but you can fold them in half if need be!)
- Step 2 Preheat oven to 350F. Line cookie sheets with silicone baking mats or parchment paper. Prepare your 4″ circle guide on a separate piece of parchment
- Step 3 Whisk flour, sugar, starch, and salt together in a medium bowl. Set aside
- Step 4 In a separate bowl, whisk egg whites until frothy. Add vanilla, oil, and water. Whisk together
- Step 5 Add egg white mixture to dry ingredients and whisk until smooth
- Step 6 Scoop tablespoons of batter onto cookie sheets and spread into 4″ circles using the back of a spoon
- Step 7 Bake for 8-12 minutes or until 1/2″ of the edge is golden brown
- Step 8 Remove from oven & flip using a thin, metal spatula. Place fortune on one half. Use spatula to fold cookie in half.
- Step 9 Carefully pick up hot cookie with both hands with open edge facing upwards and pull over the edge of a coffee cup
- Step 10 Place each shaped cookie in a cupcake tin so it will hold its shape while it cools
- Step 11 11. When completely cooled, dip ends in melted chocolate and sprinkles of your choice! (Optional)
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