Nut Butter Biscuits

Now, I will admit, these biscuits were an accident. I was trying to make nut butter, where you blitz nuts in a food processor until they turn creamy through releasing their own oils, but after an hour of processing, I still had nothing but a gritty (albeit tasty) thick paste. Feeling sorry for my poor food processor, I decided to call it quits and rather than throw the paste away, I made biscuits with it instead.

Ingredients

250g mixed nuts (I used almonds, cashews and pistachios)

2 teaspoons honey

300g self raising flour

170g butter

110g sugar

1 egg, beaten

Few drops of vanilla essence

100g milk chocolate

Put the mixed nuts and honey in the bowl of a food processor and blitz for about 10 minutes until the nuts form a rough paste.

In a large mixing bowl, rub the butter and flour together with your fingertips until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.

Stir in the nut paste, sugar, egg and vanilla essence, making sure it’s well combined, and form into a ball. Wrap in clingfilm and leave in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Pre-heat your oven to 180c, and lightly grease two baking trays. Roll out the dough onto a lightly floured surface to approx 5mm thick. Use a cookie cutter or glass to cut out all your biscuits, rerolling any left over dough until it’s all used up. Space the cookies out on the baking sheets, leaving a gap between them as they spread slightly. Bake for 12 minutes, and leave to cool on a wire rack.

While the cookies are cooling, melt the chocolate in a bowl over a pan of simmering water and leave to cool for a few minutes. Once the chocolate has cooled, but not set, dip the cookies into the chocolate and place on a sheet of baking paper to set.