Shortbread

My Jammie Dodger-ish jam tarts gave me cravings for the actual thing so I wanted to try and make a home made version.  Looking into exactly what type of biscuit a Jammie Dodger is, I learnt it is shortbread.  Thus I went hunting for a shortbread recipe.  Turns out, originally it was just flour, butter and sugar.  However, over time other things were added to create different textures.  I ended up going with a recipe that incorporated cornflour because it makes a nice melt-in-the-mouth biscuit.  And it does.  Unfortunately, the dough I ended up with was too soft to cut shapes from so in the end I just had to make shortbread.  No Jammie Dodger clones this time but it is still on my to-do list.  I'll just need to find a different recipe.

Recipe - adapted from Sue Lawrence's Recipe

Made 32 small petticoat tails

• 175g/6oz butter
• 85g/3oz caster sugar
• 200g/7oz plain flour
• 50g/1.75oz cornflour

1. Preheat the oven to 150°C/300°F/Gas Mark 2 and grease/line two 18cm/7 inch circular tins or two baking trays (I did the latter because I was expecting to make something else).
2. Cream the butter and sugar together until really smooth and creamy.  This takes about 10 minutes by hand and results in a sore arm.
3. Sift the two flours together in a separate bowl.
4. Add the flour to the butter mix a spoonful at a time and mix.  Only add the next spoonful after the first is fully incorporated.
5. When all the flour is in, bring it together with your hands and split into two balls. 
6. Gently roll out into two circles just smaller than your tins (if you're using them).   I put mine between clingfilm to stop them sticking to the rolling pin.  It also made transferring it to the trays easier.
7. Prick all over with a fork, making sure the fork goes right through to the bottom.  The press around the edges, again with a fork.
8. Put in the oven.  The recipe says to bake for 35-40 minutes but I'd say you could leave it in a bit longer as I don't think mine cooked right the way through.  Only another 2-5 minutes though.
9. When it's removed from the oven it will still be soft so be careful.  Leave on the trays/in the tins but place them on wire racks.  At this point you should cut each circle into 16 pieces.  If you want to, sprinkle sugar over them.  Leave to cool for 20 minutes.
10. After 20 minutes, carefully remove from tins/trays and place on the wire racks to finish cooling.  They harden up as they cool.

 

Consensus was that these were yummy.  Shame the box I put them in wasn't very good since they'd gone soft today.