More Christmas Biscuits

Thurs 21 Dec 2006

You could be forgiven for thinking that I never bake anything that's not sweet, and this is partially true. Which is a bit odd because I am far fussier about sweet food and have a tendancy to prefer savoury. Anyway, there's been a bit of a recent baking frenzy, as I'm going away for over a week and I am almost in shock from the thought of being without my kitchen (and food processor!) for so long ...

I spotted these cheddar and stilton biscuits in the free Asda magazine for December and thought I should have a go ... with a food processor, they're very simple. As usual, a few changes along the way ...

Take 225g of plain flour and add 1/2 tsp of Keen's Curry Powder (the original recipe said 1/4 tsp of cayenne and 1/4 tsp mustard powder) then process with 125g of unsalted butter. Add 75g of cheddar (finely grated, or, with a food processor you can just chop it) and 50g of stilton (crumbled). Finally add 1 egg and process until it comes into a ball.

Lightly knead the dough, wrap in cling film and rest in the fridge for about half an hour.

Roll out to approx 5 mm thick and cut into biscuits. Bake at 180C for about 20 minutes. Leave on the tray for about 10 minutes, before transferring to a wire rack to cool.


The verdict: Housemate and I both really liked them, although I would be tempted to go for more curry powder/cayenne. At work, I had one request for discrete pieces of stilton (easily done - crumble the stilton and knead it though the dough rather than processing it in), two requests for the biscuits being less well cooked (in which case, I'd use an egg wash to help them brown up) and one request for the biscuits to be crisper.

I guess this proves you can't please everyone at once!

The biscuits are great by themselves, but if you're entertaining you could always top with a sliver of parma ham and some tapenade or anchoiade.

tagged with: cheese, baking, biscuits

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