Cooking Club: Japanese

So The Veg and I along with a few others from work have this cooking club thing. We get together once a month or so and have a great meal. This last month was a Japanese meal, sushi, soup, and cookies and ice cream.

ummm, cookies and ice cream??

Yes, as you can see we stuck with the traditional meal and I got to make the traditional cookies and ice cream. Actually, they were definitely Asian inspired and gluten-free and vegan to boot. I'm sure you are all on the edge of you seats waiting for the fantastic recipes that follow!

Jasmine green tea Almond Breeze "Ice Cream"

3 cups Almond Breeze
4 TBS Jasmine Dragon Pearl loose leaf tea
2/3 cup sugar
2 TBS Arrowroot

I think that is the recipe, I am currently doing this from my faulty memory*

Bring 2 cups of the Almond Breeze to a boil add the tea and steep off heat for 15 minutes

meanwhile, stir together the remaining sugar and Almond Breeze, bring this to a boil making sure all of the sugar has dissolved add the arrowroot stir in and take off heat. last time I added the arrowroot straight to the hot liquid, I think it would incorporate better if you mixed it with a little of the Almond Breeze with it before adding it to the hot liquid.

Strain the tea out of the reserved Almond Breeze and mix it in with the hot liquid. Chill overnight and then use your ice cream maker of choice to turn it into frozen goodness.
* I think I may have added some vanilla too, I'll have to go back and check.... nope no vanilla added

* Please note the very Asian maple leaf cookie cutter I found at Dekalb.

Now, Black Sesame Cookies with Matcha Tea Icing
totally ripped from this site: justhungry.com made gluten-free and veganized by me and the Veg

The real ingredient list: (modifications in italics)

Black sesame cookies with matcha icing

For the cookies:

• 50g / 1.75 oz. raw black sesame seeds
• 120g / 4.25 oz. dark brown muscovado sugar
• 250g / 8.8 oz. whole wheat or white cake flour (‘soft’ flour) or regular white all-purpose flour (totally skipped this flour and added the "nearly normal" mix I always talk about)
  
• 100g / 3.5 oz. unsalted butter, at room temperature (we are going vegan here folks, so some strange margarine took the place along with vegan shortening when we ran out of the margarine. Mom, please stop shuddering at the word margarine, I promise I don't have any in my house!)
  
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1 large egg (again vegan, I was going to use egg replacer, but the Veg didn't have any so we mixed a tablespoon or so of tapioca starch with about a quarter cup of water, it kind of worked)
  
• A few dashes of almond extract

For the icing:

• 8 Tbs. powdered (icing) sugar
• 2 Tbs. matcha tea powder
• 1 Tbs. egg white or egg white substitute

* I don't think I measured any of this and just did water instead of the egg white. Oh, and the only matcha tea I could find was double matcha green tea. Hence, the green flecks in the icing.

recipe directions can be found here: Leaf shaped black sesame cookies with matcha tea icing

Believe it or not both were very yummy and will be made again...