Sweetheart Biscuits
0 Review
| A very delicious way to say I love you. If you don’t have heart shaped cookie cutters you could use round ones instead. Chilling the dough in the freezer or fridge before cooking helps keep the shortbread in shape when it is cooked in the oven. | ||
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Ingredients55g (2oz) butter, softened To Sandwich the Hearts 40g (1 ½ oz) white chocolate chopped
Method Beat the butter, sugar, vanilla and a pinch of salt until combined. Add the flour and stir in with a wooden spoon, then bring the dough together with your hands. If the dough is very soft then wrap in clingfilm and chill for around 30 minutes. Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface to around 2mm (1/16 in) thick. Cut out 16 heart shapes using a 6cm cookie cutter, re-rolling the scraps as necessary. Put 8 dough hearts on one baking sheet. Cut heart centres from the remaining 8 dough hearts, using a small heart shaped cutter. Transfer these dough hearts to a second baking sheet. Chill both baking sheets for 10 minutes in the freezer or 1 hour in the refrigerator. Preheat the oven to 180c/Fan 160/350 F/ Gas 4. Bake the shortbread until slightly golden around the edges – this will take 10 to 12 minutes for the ones with the hearts cut out and 13 to 15 minutes for the solid ones. Cool on the baking sheets for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. |
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Melt the white chocolate in a small heatproof bowl set over, not in, a pan of warm water. Stir frequently and watch carefully as white chocolate can overheat very easily. Remove the bowl from the pan when you can still se a few un-melted lumps of chocolate and stir the mixture until smooth. Set aside for 10-20 minutes, to let the chocolate ganache cool and thicken slightly. Meanwhile, dust the cookies with the cut out centres with icing sugar.
Spread a scant 1/2 tbsp of white chocolate over each solid heart cookie, leaving a border aroud the edge (the chocolate will spread as you sandwich the cookies. Put a blob of jam, approx. 1/4 tsp, in the centre of each. Sandwich the cookies with the sugar-dusted tops (hold by the edges to avoid fingerprints in the icing sugar) and add a little extra jam in the cut out centre, if needed. Refrigerate for 10-20 minutes, until the chocolate has set, then store in a cool place.
Party planning – the cookies dough can be cut out and frozen on baking sheets lined with parchment. Transfer to a resealable box once solid and bake direct from frozen, as described above. The baked and sandwiched cookies can be stored in an airtight container in a cool place for up to 1 day.
