hello this is chef john from food wishes comm with fortune cookies that's right
i'm going to show you how to make your very own fortune cookies at home which
is a surprisingly simple operation and not only is this an easy recipe that
produces a very tasty thin crispy cookie but it's also a lot of fun since we get
to put any messages we want inside i mean the mind reels with possibilities
so with that let's go ahead and get started and what we'll need to do before
we start making our cookies is prepare our fortunes which you're gonna have to
compose print out and then cut up into a size that will fit inside your cookie
and to make life easier the smaller the better so once I cut in between these
I'll probably also trim off a little bit from the ends and traditionally as the
name might indicate these are generally like some kind of prediction for the
future but nowadays that's usually not the case they tend to be more along the
lines of deep thoughts or cryptic observations for example something like
no matter where you go there you are or a broken cookie will tell you nothing
but a broken heart will so true or learn from your mistakes but maybe not so
often okay so you'll have to go ahead and create a bunch of those and if you
get stuck just use some old Chinese restaurant classics like you're about to
embark on a great adventure or this next year will bring you great fame and
fortune which are a little cliche but at least they'll give your guests some
false hope and that's it once we have our fortunes done we can move on to this
extremely simple batter which is going to consist of one egg white which we
will separate into this bowl and by the way unlike when we're making meringue if
you get a little bit of the yolk in this you don't have to throw it out it's
going to be fine and then to that we will add some white sugar a little
splash of milk and by the way I used almond milk which is why it's now white
we will also do a little bit of pure real vanilla extract as well as some
element extract and if you want some folks even put a little bit of sesame
oil in this we will also want to add a little pinch of salt and then we'll
finish up the wet ingredients with a little bit of melted butter and we'll go
ahead and take a whisk and give that a mix
and then once our mixture is nice and smooth and we can feel that all that
sugars been dissolved we will stop and add the last ingredient some all-purpose
flour and we will go ahead and whisk that in to create a very very soft semi
runny spreadable batter and keep in mind if this batter is too thin your cookies
will be very fragile and hard to work with but we don't want it too thick
either because then we'll end up with just like a sugar cookie so you're about
to see the texture I like to go for and it will be up to you to adjust with
either a little more flour or a little more milk or water
I mean you are after all the Confucious of your batters looseness so just if you
have to but ultimately you want to end up with something that looks and feels
like this and then once that's at well go ahead and transfer on about a
tablespoon or so onto a Silpat lined baking sheet and we'll use the back of
our spoon to spread that out nice and thin into a circle about four inches or
so and I'm just gonna do two per pan for filming purposes but once you get the
swing of this you could probably do four per pan but anyway we will spread that
batter out into a circular shape as shown making sure we knock down any
larger Peaks and sometimes that helps settle it if you want to give it the OL
hole tap a tappa which is really more of a bang and or a little shake go ahead
but to be honest I don't know if that does too much although it does feel
pretty good and that's it our batter is now ready to transfer into the center of
a 350 degree oven for about ten minutes or so or until 50 to 75% of the cookie
is browned at which point pay attention because we
have to move fast and what we'll do with the help of a spatula is make sure
that's loosened from the pan and then we will place one fortune inside and fold
it over exactly in half or at least attempt to
and then what we'll do is sort of press those edges together and then somehow
pick up the cookie and bend it directly in half on the edge of the pan sort of
folding it like this and then so it holds its shape while it cools we're
gonna have to put it into some kind of ramekin or muffin tin and you want to
leave it there until it cools at which point you can check out the final shape
which you know is not that good all right I'm not good at a lot of things
and one of them is fortune cookie forming but for our first one that is
not bad and you'll see you'll get a lot better at these as you do them okay so
let's move to the next one which because I took so long with the first one and
was moving the camera and stuff is now too stiff to fold because it's cooled
but what we can do is pop that back into the oven for a few minutes until it
softens up again at which point we should be able to shave it okay so we'll
place our fortune in and we'll fold it over and kind of press those edges
together the best we can and then we'll bend it over the edge of the pan oh and
as we're folding this we're trying to get that outside edge to kind of curl up
a little bit so that we get more of that signature fortune cookie shape so that
one was a little better still not great but pretty good and that's it
we will simply continue on until our batters gone and like I said the more
you do the better you get and as far as portioning goes a one egg white recipe
which is what we did will make between 10 and 12 fortune cookies depending on
the size which should easily cover your average dinner party and as I mentioned
once you bend that on the edge of the pan you sort of want to try to get those
outside edges to curl up a little to form sort of a brim which will
definitely make these look a little better and more authentic and by the way
if you're wondering if this is kind of painful and I'm burning the tips of my
fingers yes a little bit but I have fairly calloused fingers so it really
wasn't that bad but if you don't feel free to use some gloves and by the way
don't be in a big hurry to pull those out and see your shape or I let them
cool because if you pull them out when they're still warm they're gonna kind of
spread open so be sure to let those cool before you pull them out and again if
you don't have this sized ramekin just a good old-fashioned muffin tin will work
the same and that's it before you know you're gonna have a beautiful plate of
homemade fortune cookies which are now ready to crack open so
they can reveal their words of wisdom so let's go ahead and see what this one
says sink your teeth into the ass of life and drag it to you now that my
friends is some great advice and yes in case you're wondering that is from the
movie big night and above and beyond the valuable life coaching these can provide
you've also made a very delicious sweet crispy sugar cookie which is never not a
great way to end a meal especially a great big spread of homemade Chinese
food or at least our take on it but anyway let me go ahead and open one more
before we finish whoops I just tore the fortune in half that can't be good and
now the other piece is stuck to the fold so this one did not go as planned
and what was the fortune of course the one about learning from your mistakes
well played universe well played but anyway that's it how to make your own
homemade fortune cookies I mean just imagine putting a plate of these out
after a big Chinese inspired feast I mean your guests will be like wow you
are so creative and seem to have a lot of free time on your hands but whether
you're doing this to impress some dinner party guests or you've wanted to propose
to somebody and just couldn't figure out the right way to do it yes an engagement
ring will fit in these perfectly but no matter what the reason or your message I
really do hope you give these a try soon so head over to food wishes dot-com for
all the ingredient amounts of Morpho as usual and does all
enjoy
you