Gingernuts with Custard Cream filling!!

Fox’s Biscuits make a biscuit called Ginger Crunch Creams. I love these things. If I ever leave England these would be in my top 5 of most missed treats. So, I had been thinking about making my own for a while. I mean it’s just a crunchy ginger cookie with cream smooshed in the middle. (Word is trying to correct smooshed hahaha!!)

Baking is a huge trend at the moment so I wasn’t surprised to see that Jamie Oliver jumped on the bandwagon with an issue of his magazine dedicated to baking (Issue 27 Mar/Apr 2012). I am glad he jumped because this issue has a lot of interesting recipes.

There is a whole section for homemade biscuits based off of shop-bought favorites. I took the recipe for the ginger nuts and then halved the recipe of the cream filling from the custard cream recipe! Then like magic I had my favorite shop-bought biscuit, but even better!! These turned out exactly how I wanted them too!! Enjoy!!

Notice how I switch between calling these biscuits and cookies. Ha! My 4 year old already corrects my American words. It’s a little annoying to be honest. Humph. ;0]

makes 16 (8 if you are sandwiching them together)

100g self-rising flour

½ tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 tsp ground ginger

a few gratings of nutmeg

¼ tsp allspice

50g light muscovado sugar

50g butter, cubed, softened

2 tbsp golden syrup

Demerara sugar, for sprinkling

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180C/gas 4 and line a baking sheet.
2. Put all the dry ingredients into a large bowl and then rub in the butter until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.
3. Stir in the syrup, and press into a dough
4. Divide into 16 pieces (I weighed mine out because every time I try to break into equal pieces I fail.) they should weigh about 15g each give or a take a little.
5. Roll each piece into a ball and place on the prepared baking sheet. Use a bottom of a glass to flatten them.
6. Sprinkle some of the demerara sugar onto each one; I didn’t have this so I just used regular granulated sugar. The demerara sugar is bigger granules and would work better the regular sugar just sort of blended into the biscuit. Press the sugar into the cookie with your fingers.
7. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until golden brown.
8. Remove the biscuits and let them cool for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.

for the custard cream:

100g icing sugar

2 tbsp custard powder

50g unsalted butter, softened

boiling water

1. Mix the icing sugar and custard powder together in a big bowl.
2. Then beat in the butter, this is why I suggest a big bowl. I used my medium sized bowl and the sugar/powder mix went everywhere the second I turned on my hand mixer. If I had the bigger bowl it has bigger sides and wouldn’t have puffed up into my face!!
3. Add 1 tsp of boiling water and mix until smooth.
4. Cover and set-aside until ready to use.

To finish: Spread each side of the cookie with the custard cream and smoosh them together!!

note: there are no eggs in this recipe