SHORTBREAD
SHORTBREAD is one of the best biscuits around. It is a guaranteed favourite among any guests and will always impress in its own, subtle way. 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 a collection of 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 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 once he went to cut a slice from it?
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
WINNER
Hands down, Prue.