Baked goods almonds

I use ground almonds (also called almond flour) to make bread, muffins, cookies, and other baked goods. Almond milk, a delicious alkalizing substitute for dairy milk, is terrific as a drink in its own right or as a base for smoothies. It can also be used in baking or added to herbal teas. See page 145 for a basic almond milk recipe. 

Usage With its intense almond and cherry-like aroma, it is used for flavouring sweets and baked goods, for stone-fruit flavourings. 

The latest of the different oils to be the darlings of the cooking world are cold or expeller pressed tree nut oils, more particularly hazelnut oil, walnut oil and almond oil. Most nut oils taste like the nut from which they were extracted. They make a delicious, tasty, unique flavour statement, even when blended in a small amount to mild-flavoured food oil such as canola. Not only do the nut oils add great flavour to food, they also carry health benefits because of a similar co-fatty acid balance as olive oil. Nut oils in general are excellent used in salad dressing, over pasta with some cheese, in baked goods or for dipping French bread into (Table 9.1.8). 

Finely ground peanut or pecan butter, or thoroughly comminuted almonds, when added to pancakes or waffles up to about 5%, improve the flavor and texture and increase the nutritional quality. Similar results are obtained when superfine nut particles are added to baked goods such as cookies, wafers, tea cakes and ginger snaps. 

Bitter almonds contain pmssic acid and should not be eaten but sweet almonds are popular eaten alone when dried, or when roasted and salted. Almonds are also used in a variety of products, including candies and rich pastries. Additionally, other imaginative uses for almonds may be found, such as waffles, biscuits, muffins, vegetable salads, topping for baked goods, or as additions to meats, poultry, or seafood salads. Almond oil is used in flavoring extracts. 

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