Empire Biscuits

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Two baking trays
• •Baking parchment
• •Rolling pin
• •6cm round cutter
• •Wire cooling rack
• •Small palette knife

Instructions

1. 1

   Cream butter and sugar

   Beat the softened butter and sugar together until pale and a little fluffy. Not whipped to within an inch of its life, just lightened. A few minutes with a wooden spoon or a couple with an electric beater. The butter must be properly soft for this. Cold butter will fight you the whole way.

   If you've forgotten to take the butter out, cube it and leave it on a plate near the warm oven for ten minutes. Don't try to melt it. Soft is the word, not liquid.
2. 2

   Bring the dough together

   Sift the flour, cornflour and salt over the butter mixture. Stir gently with a wooden spoon until it starts to come together, then bring it into a ball with your hands. Don't knead it. Shortbread doesn't want gluten development; it wants short, tender crumbs. The moment it holds together, stop.

3. 3

   Rest the dough

   Flatten the dough into a thick disc, wrap it, and put it in the fridge for at least thirty minutes. This is not optional. Cold dough rolls better, holds its shape better in the oven, and bakes into a more tender biscuit. Make a cup of tea while you wait.

4. 4

   Roll and cut

   Set the oven to 170C/150C fan. Line two baking trays with parchment. Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface to about 5mm thick. Cut into rounds with a 6cm cutter. You want twenty-four in total because each biscuit is a sandwich. Re-roll the scraps once, no more, or the second batch will be tougher than the first.

5. 5

   Bake until pale gold

   Lift the rounds onto the trays with a palette knife. Bake for twelve to fifteen minutes. You're looking for the palest gold imaginable, with edges just barely turning. Shortbread should never brown properly. If the tops are colouring, you've gone too far. Trust your nose. When the kitchen smells of warm butter and the biscuits look set but still pale, they're done.

   Let them cool on the tray for five minutes before moving them. Hot shortbread is fragile and breaks if you look at it wrong. Cooled shortbread is sturdy enough to sandwich.
6. 6

   Sandwich with jam

   Once the biscuits are completely cool, turn half of them upside down. Spoon a generous teaspoon of raspberry jam into the centre of each. Don't spread it thin. The jam is half the point. Press another biscuit gently on top. The jam should just kiss the edges without oozing out. If it oozes, you've used too much. Eat that one. Try again.

7. 7

   Make the icing

   Sift the icing sugar into a bowl and add the water or lemon juice a teaspoon at a time, stirring with a small spoon, until you have a thick, smooth icing that holds a soft peak when you lift the spoon. It should be the consistency of double cream that has been whipped just to the point of holding its shape. Too runny and it slides off the biscuit. Too stiff and it won't settle into a smooth top. Lemon juice gives a sharper finish that cuts through the richness, which I prefer, but water is traditional.

8. 8

   Ice and crown

   Spoon a heaped teaspoon of icing onto the top of each sandwich. Use the back of the spoon to nudge it gently toward the edges, letting it find its own level. It should cover most of the top but not drip down the sides. Place a glace cherry in the centre while the icing is still wet so it sets in place. Leave the biscuits somewhere cool for an hour or so until the icing has firmed to a matte, slightly crisp shell.

Chef Tips

• •The butter has to be properly soft before you start. Cold butter creams badly, leaves lumps in the dough, and gives you uneven biscuits. If you can press a thumb into the block and leave a clear dent without effort, you're ready.
• •Use the best raspberry jam you can find, ideally one with whole fruit suspended in it. The jam is doing real work here, not just gluing the biscuits together. A dull jam makes a dull biscuit, no matter how good the shortbread is.
• •Don't be tempted to skip the cornflour. It's what gives the shortbread its short, melting texture, the crumb that dissolves on your tongue rather than crunching. Plain flour alone gives you a sturdier, more biscuit-like result. Fine, but not the same thing.
• •If glace cherries genuinely offend you, a small piece of crystallized ginger or a whole almond will do the job. But really, try the cherry first. They're better than you remember.

Advance Preparation

• •The shortbread dough can be made up to two days ahead and kept wrapped in the fridge. Let it sit at room temperature for ten minutes before rolling, or it will crack.
• •The unfilled, un-iced biscuits keep in an airtight tin for up to a week. Sandwich and ice them on the day you plan to serve them, or the icing softens and the shortbread loses its snap.
• •Once assembled, empire biscuits keep in a tin between layers of parchment for three or four days. They're best on the second day, when the jam has softened the inside of the shortbread just slightly.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 90g)