MILLIONAIRE’S SHORTBREAD? I’D RATHER BE A SHORTBREAD MILLIONAIRE!
Meet the Scot turning granny’s recipe into a US foodie sensation
WhAT would Grandma Pearl, from the Moray village of Kinloss, say if she knew that an old family recipe is now the hottest trend among New York’s notoriously fickle foodies?
In recent years, the Big Apple has gone crazy for the rainbow bagel, the cronut (a combination of a croissant and a doughnut), the sushi doughnut (a ring of rice and raw fish) and the raindrop cake (a transparent, Japanese jelly). But its newest sweet treat is good old Scottish shortbread – with a secret speakeasy twist.
Francis Legge made his name as the ‘Doughnut King’ on US Masterchef Season 5, where he impressed Gordon Ramsay by making 12 signature doughnut flavours in less than an hour – including a prosciutto and Guinness flavour, which the host described as ‘absolutely delicious’.
he went on to open his own bakery in Astoria, Queens, where he expanded his doughnut repertoire with flavours including ketchup, BLT, chicken and waffle, and the doughnutchino – a cold brew coffee crowned with cream, sprinkles, and mini doughnuts.
But, as Covid-19 took hold of the city, he was forced to close. And, as he sat at home with his American wife Christine, they hatched a plan to launch his granny’s signature shortbread on an unsuspecting Instagram audience.
‘My father was in the Scots Guards,’ he says. ‘So we travelled around the world – hong Kong, Northern Ireland, Wales, Germany. But we would always go back to Kinloss for the holidays. That’s when my Grandma Pearl and Grandpa Frank would be cooking, grandkids by their side.
‘They had a garden centre in Kinloss called Legge’s Nursery, and they would grow all their own ingredients. And they had this tiny little kitchen with a Rayburn. On certain holidays, we’d put tables out in the greenhouses and there would be about 40 people sitting down to eat. And she always made the same desserts,’ he remembers. ‘Truffles, apple tarts, rhubarb tarts, pies. They would make all types of jams and jellies. There was this dessert that I really want to make – it was a little tart with golden syrup and coconut, and they would bake it down until it was really, really thick. It was one of the most incredible things ever.’
LeGGe and his wife launched The Shortbread Society last June, just as New York – at one time the epicentre of the pandemic – was beginning to open up after lockdown. ‘People were stuck at home with no jobs, trying to be safe,’ he says. ‘So we produced this fun food outlet for them, a secret Scottish Shortbread Society. everyone’s obsessed with their Scottish ancestry here.’
They started with Granny Pearl’s signature millionaire’s shortbread. ‘I made it for the wife years ago when we first met and she just fell in love with it,’ says Legge. ‘She says it’s the best thing she’s ever had, and still is.’
he took that to the next level with a special billionaire’s version, topped with 24k gold dust, then expanded to include a traditional Bakewell tart flavour with a frangipane centre; a banana Nutella flavour; and Fruity Pebbles shortbread, made with coloured Rice Krispies. Yuzu and matcha flavours also get an honourable mention, while the Marie Antoinette is a decadent combination of pistachio shortbread, almond filling, marzipan, pink almond shortbread, and French macarons.
And at the heart of each slice: Grandma Pearl’s ancient recipe. he’ll never tell what makes it so special. ‘It’s a real secret,’ he says, but hints: ‘I use a fatty butter. And the salt is really important. I use large chunks of salt, so it’s one of the last things you’re chewing, and it bursts in your mouth.’
But as far as the original shortbread goes, ‘I leave it down to the ingredients and let them shine,’ he says. ‘It’s four or five basic ingredients. That’s how it started in Scotland, back in the 1600s.
‘They weren’t going, “Grab the vanilla!” This is what they had, Granny knew how to cook it, and it just passed on from generation to generation.’
They post a new menu every week, then the orders start rolling in. each customer is then given a secret location where they can pick up their order. ‘It’s a private conversation with every buyer and the wife,’ says Legge. ‘They will be given a rough idea of location – say Gramercy Park. Then we whittle it down with text clues as they get closer.
‘Pretty much instantly, things blew up. We had a few food bloggers – @foodbabyny for one, which is a major New York food family with 320,000 followers, which goes around the city, highlighting restaurants. They bought a bunch of stuff and posted about it and that first week it went insane.’
Then Jenny Mollen, the actress wife of American Pie star Jason Biggs, heard about it. The pair picked up an order of apple pie shortbread – now permanently renamed American Pie – and things went ‘absolutely crazy’.
‘It really blew up to a point where I was baking 18 hours a day. And the more we kept it mysterious, the more popular it got,’ he says.
TheIR customers range from 20 years old to 65 years old. ‘We have quite a few Scottish customers, which I love,’ he says. ‘And British people, because we have the Bakewell tart.’ Though he adds that english customers are often pretty sceptical – until they taste it.
For St Andrew’s Day he created a shortbread topped with a whisky glaze made from a $300 bottle of rare cask Macallan, and for Thanksgiving in the US last year he created a special recipe that included a layer of bourbonsoaked pecans, peach pie filling, and a pipette of real bourbon.
It’s a long way from cooking in Grandma’s tiny kitchen. So how did an Army brat from Kinloss end up on US Masterchef?
‘I was a music video director and photographer, and I made a documentary called the Godfather of Disco,’ says Legge. ‘It’s all about the Paradise Garage in New York’s West end records. I got to interview these incredible DJs from the past.’
While in New York, he met wife Christine at a gallery opening. he was filming for the artist; she was a naked model for the event. ‘We fell in love at first sight.’
They settled in Manhattan, getting a regular Scottish fix courtesy of Gordon Ramsay on Masterchef. ‘I love Gordon Ramsay,’ says Legge. ‘he’s the number one Scottish icon in the world, in my opinion. And we’d always laugh because Christine would be like, “Oh, you could do this.” So she made me apply.’
An enthusiastic amateur chef, he had been experimenting with molecular gastronomy at the time. In episode four, he won the doughnut challenge, ‘and the rest,’ says Legge, ‘is history. Then it all came to a grinding halt with Covid.’
And while the Shortbread Society’s fame is growing across New York, he is convinced Scots would be equally hooked. ‘I think, with the time and world that we’re in, and how we’re always looking for new things, it would really work. But just in the big cities,’ he adds.
he is working on getting the website perfect and providing a delivery option for those who cannot get to New York. There is also the possibility of pop-ups in cities such as LA or Chicago – even London.
‘I never thought I was going to become a chef,’ he says, ‘but then my granny taught me to make millionaire’s shortbread. hopefully, we get to be millionaires, right?’