strawberry, white chocolate and macadamia nut cookies

I have been on a bit of a cookie making mission lately and decided to revisit a previous winning recipe of white choc, cranberry and pecan nut cookies, but this time I used dried strawberries instead of cranberries, and macadamia nuts instead of pecans.

I had bought the dried strawberries in Stellenbosch on a strawberry farm, but saw them the other day at Komati foods in Obs. If you havent tried a dried strawberry yet, put it on your list.  They have a very intense and concentrated strawberry flavour with a pleasing soft and chewy texture, and I had been wanting to incorporate them into a recipe for a while.

They turned out beautifully.

This is what you need to make these:

• 300gm white chocolate (cut up into chunks – big and small)
• 100gm butter
• 1 egg
• 50gm muscovado sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 180gm (or 1 1/4 cup) flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 85gm caster sugar
• 50-70gm dried strawberries
• 50 -70gm macadamia nuts chopped 

how to make:

• oven on at 180 degrees c
• melt 85gms of the choc in a double boiler, then cool a little
• beat butter, egg, sugars and vanilla with an electric beater until creamy
• beat in the melted choc
• stir in the flour, baking powder, strawberries, nuts and remaining chocolate to make a stiff dough
• using a tablespoon measure , drop small mounds well spaced on a lined baking sheet (silicone baking sheets work really well)
• you could also reserve some of the nuts, berries and chocolate pieces and place these into the cookies after they are on the tray so they poke out (extra pretty)
• bake for 12 minutes
• allow to cool for 1 -2 minutes then put on a cooling rack (this is quite important as they carry over cooking quite a bit after baking and can go a bit too brown if left on the baking pan)
• You could double up and freeze the already formed cookie discs for later use

Adding the melted chocolate to the dough makes these ultra decadent and are best enjoyed slightly warm immediately after baking.