I have a hankering for a biscuit from years ago, Royal Scot. They were made by McVities but I think production ceased in the 1970s. They were a delicious shortbread type biscuit, rich in colour and flavour and with a great texture.
Since I have been unable to find any recipe that purports to be similar I decided to try to make my own. As a first step I have come up with what I think is just about the perfect shortbread biscuit, or cookie. These are crisp in texture and they just about melt in the mouth with a lovely buttery flavour and they are not too sweet.
Although they are definitely not a substitute for Royal Scot biscuits they area good substitute and something that I can work on over the next few weeks.
The recipe is very simple, using flour, butter and sugar. Adding ground rice(or fine semolina) adds a lovely sandy texture too. I also added some diastatic malt powder, in the hope that it would add some colour to the biscuits, and a very slight flavour. But I don’t think it actually made much of a difference at all. So although I show it in the recipe below it most certainly is only optional.
My biscuits turned out very well indeed, I loved the texture and the taste was wonderful. I will be making them again for sure, and tweaking the recipe on my quest for a Royal Scot substitute.
Ingredients:
- 225g(1 cup)cold unsalted butter, cubed
- 230g(1 3/4 cups) plain flour
- 70g(1/2 cup) ground rice or fine semolina
- 75g(1/2 cup + 1 tbsp) icing sugar
- 1 tsp diastatic malt powder(optional).
Method:
- Line a couple of baking trays with parchment paper.
- Add all the ingredients into a food processor(or rub butter into dry ingredients by hand) and pulse/process until the mixture begins to clump.
- Tip out onto a work surface and use your hands to squeeze the mixture into a dough ball.
- Flour the surface and roll the dough out(I cut mine in two to roll out, for ease) to a thickness of 1/4 inch/5mm.
- Use the scalloped side of a cookie cutter, 2.5 inches/7cm in diameter, to cut out shapes.
- Use a skewer to poke holes in the dough, about 17 holes, in two circles of 8 and one hole in the middle(or however you wish to do it).
- Carefully transfer the cut out cookies to the baking tray and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.
- Meanwhile preheat the oven to 180C/160C Fan/350F.
- Bake the cookies in the oven for 12-15 minutes, until they have turned a nice golden colour(mine took 15 minutes).
- Remove from the oven and leave on the baking tray for a couple of minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before serving.
Hi, from memory there was a very slight saltiness in the Royal Scots.
I miss these biscuits too – hence googling them and finding your recipe. I will give it a go. I seem to remember Royal Scot having a slight sprinkling of salt on the top?
Yes, definitely the salt was important to the experience of eating them. I remember the lovely hit of salt crystals on my tongue.