I saw a very interesting recipe on Giallozafferano website, for a a biscuit, or cookie, flavoured with cinnamon. The biscuits looked as though they would be nice and crunchy and I do love the taste of cinnamon. So I decided that I would make them and see how they tatsed.
I have to say they do taste very good indeed and they have a lovely crunch to them too. Of course the amount of cinnamon is a matter of preference, so more could be used than in the recipe below if desired. For me the amount I used was just about perfect, since it gave the flavour and it didn’t overpower my taste buds.
In the original recipe it specifies baking for 20 minutes, and I mention that time in my video. However, as I also say in the video, mine looked well baked at 17 minutes, using a static oven. So I took them out at that stage. If I had left them for longer they would definitely have been over-baked. The actual temperature of ovens varies from one to another, so it is not surprising that sometimes thee baking time needs to be adjusted. My recommendation is to bake these without using convection and to keep an eye on the biscuits as they bake, so you can take them out when they begin to colour. I would guess between 15 and 20 minutes for most people.
I made patterns on my with a fork and another implement, but they could simply be baked without, maybe with just a few holes poked into the tops.
Mine turned out very well indeed. These are biscuits that I shall make again in the lead up to Christmas.
Another very quick recipes, and one of my favourites, is Abbey Crunch Biscuits.
Ingredients:
- 250g(1 2/3 cups, based on scooping packed flour into a 250ml cup) cake/patsry flour, or plain flour.
- 100g (1/2 cup) caster sugar, granulated is fine
- 125g(scant 9 tbsp) unsalted butter, chilled and cubed
- 1 medium egg(large in USA)
- 15g honey(scant tbsp) honey
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- pinch of salt
- Place the flour, sugar, cinnamon and salt into the bowl of a food processor and mix briefly.(or into a large bowl if making by hand).
- Add the butter and process until the mixture is like fine breadcrumbs(rub between fingers by hand).
- Add the egg and the honey and process until the mixture begins to clump.
- Tip onto the work surface and pull into a dough without too much kneading.
- Form the dough into a disc and wrap in plastic wrap.
- Chill in the fridge for an hour.
- One a floured surface roll the dough out to a thickness of 5mm, or 1/4 inch.
- Use the tines of a fork to make a pattern on the top of the dough.
- Cut out the shape of biscuits with a 6cm/ 2 1/4 inch cookie cutter.
- Place on a baking tray lined with parchment paper.
- Chill in the fridge while you preheat the oven to 190C/375F.
- Place the baking trays in the oven and bake for between 15 and 20 minutes, until the biscuits begin to colour a little, but not too much.
- Remove from the oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.