Mother’s Day Mung Bean Cookie Pie

I was meant to post this on Sunday but didn’t find any time to write it down. This is a cookie pie I made for Mum on Mother’s Day which was Sunday. Well, we did not do much, but at least I baked her a cookie pie which she liked a lot! So much that there’s just 1 slice left today! Well, everyone helped in devouring up the pie!

The cookie dough recipe is based on a cookie recipe from one of Mum’s recipe books that we have at home – Indian Delights by Zohra Moosa (Mum got this book as a present but I can’t find a link or more info about it online). This book has loads of Indian recipes but also quite some Western delights and a few fusion style foods. Although not vegan, a lot of the recipes can be veganized.

The recipe in the book (Naan Khataay with Chana Flour) is intended for individual cookies but I was too lazy to bake 2-3 batches of cookies on Sunday. So I just baked the dough in a pie dish. But then I didn’t want a plain cookie and I had some boiled mung beans that was left from the Mung Bean Pasty I made the same morning. So, I made some mung bean halva and sandwiched it in.

The cookie dough for this recipe was very easy to veganize and adapt.

I made a slight tweak with the flour that was used. While the recipe calls for plain flour and baking powder, I used self-raising as I had run out of plain flour at home.

One more thing is that my kitchen scale is kind of dead. It sort of still reads but it’s wonky and the needle is kind of going in the other direction or something like that. Well, I thought I’d let the old scale retire in peace! I haven’t bought another one yet. But instead I’ve bought a basic measuring cup. I’m going to try use the cup for a while and see how I go. I find most recipes online and most of you use the cup measurement and instead of doing all these conversions every time, I’ve decided to just switch to the cup!

Ingredients (1 pie dish – 16 slices)

1 cup vegan margarine
1 cup light brown sugar (or demerara)
¾ cup chana flour (gram flour or besan)
1½ cups self-raising flour (plain flour and 1 teaspoon baking powder is also fine)
1½ cups semolina flour
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
Almonds or nuts (optional)

Edit: I just remembered, after having posted this, that I used semolina flour as well in this recipe. (The original recipe doesn't include it, so you could just use plain/self-raising and gram flour only). But semolina makes a crunchier cookie! So, I've amended the ingredients.

Mung Bean Halva:
2 cups boiled mung beans, drained and lightly mashed (or 1 – 1¼ cup dried mung beans and boiled until soft)
½ cup brown sugar
1 cup (200 ml) coconut milk (or any non-dairy)
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1 tablespoon margarine
Coconut flakes, nuts and raisins (optional)

Prepare the halva:

• Place all ingredients in a saucepan (preferably non-stick), except the margarine. Allow to simmer on low to medium heat.
• Stir and lightly mash occasionally.
• Increase heat after 10 minutes to dry up excess liquid.
• A thick paste is the desired consistency.
• Add coconut flakes, nuts and raisins if desired.
• Add margarine at the end and mix well.

Make the cookie dough:

• Preheat oven at 200 degrees Celsius.
  
• Cream margarine and sugar well.
• Add vanilla essence.
• Add all flours and mix well. Work with hands until dough is soft and smooth.

• Press half of the cookie dough obtained into ungreased pie dish (10.5 in or 27cm).
• Top with the halva, spreading and smoothing out evenly.
• Cover with the remaining cookie dough.
• Decorate with almonds or other nuts.
• Bake for 18 - 20 minutes.
• Remove and slice into triangles when still warm.
• Put back in oven for another 3 – 5 minutes.
• Allow to cool before serving.