SHORTBREAD
SHORTBREAD is Britain’s best biscuit. In the same way that Andy Murray is Britain’s best tennis player. We all know they are Scottish, but the rest of the UK also claims them as their own. Although not officially a biscuit, it is really a crumbly, sweet pastry, and quite hard to get perfect. MARY RECIPE This time I gave Mary and her love of margarine the benefit of the doubt – and was rewarded with a shortbread that even my dog turned up her nose at. Instead of cooking it in a round, it was piped (Berry seems obsessed with piping, which is a fiddle) into skinny biscuits.
Despite the pretty look, it was inedible – like a dry, tasteless pie crust. Oh Mary! TASTE 1/5 EASE 2/5 PRUE RECIPE Prue uses a combination of plain and rice flours (I bought mine from Morrisons) and adds a generous pinch of salt, which balances the sweetness nicely.
It is sprinkled with caster sugar and baked in the round, which looks pretty until you come to cut it, when it crumbles into fine sand. Or at least mine did.
Thank goodness I’m not on Bake Off. What would Paul Hollywood say?
Nonetheless, it has a wonderful grainy crumb.
I had to double the cooking time as, after the first try, it came out underbaked.
TASTE 4/5 EASE 4/5