- Makes 26 biscuits (7cm diameter) -Ready in 3 hours (this includes chilling) -
These biscuits (like the IKEA originals) freeze very happily. We always have a stash of them in the freezer. You don't even need to wait for them to defrost - they are delicious to eat straight from the freezer. Once defrosted they will lose their magic 'snap' though, so eat the have-been-frozen ones immediately.
Gather together…
85g butter.
2 tbsp ground ginger (yes tablespoons - we want them flavourful).
1 tsp ground cinnamon.
1/4 tsp ground cloves.
10 turns of a pepper grinder (or a 'normal' pinch of ground pepper).
1/16 tsp (or a very small pinch) cayenne pepper.
1/2 cup brown sugar.
1 tbsp treacle.
1 and 1/4 cups plain flour.
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda.
1 medium egg (beaten).
Plus...
2 tbsp plain white flour to dust with when shaping the biscuit dough.
Get baking…
1. In a medium saucepan, heat the 85g of butter gently on a LOW hob for a few minutes until it melts (the thickness of your pan's base will determine how long the butter takes to melt). Once the butter has melted, keep the pan on the heat for a further 2 minutes, so the butter bubbles and froths - this reduces the water content within it. Keep swirling the pan to avoid overheating as you don't want the butter to burn and taste bitter.
2. Meanwhile gather together all of the other ingredients (I weigh the spices into a small cereal bowl) .
3. Once the butter has been heating gently for 5 minutes, turn OFF the heat.
4. To the pan, add the spices (2 tbsp ground ginger, 1 tsp ground cinnamon, 1/4 tsp ground cloves, 10 turns of a pepper grinder and 1/16 tsp of cayenne pepper).
5. Add the 1/2 cup of brown sugar and the 1 tbsp of treacle.
6. Stir well for 1 minute to help the sugar and treacle dissolve in the hot butter. The mixture will look grainy and split, this is fine at this stage.
7. Leave the (split looking) spicy-buttery pan to cool for 10 minutes (as you'll be adding an egg to it shortly and you don't want to scramble it!).
8. Meanwhile, in a medium-large mixing bowl, sieve in the 1 and 1/4 cups of plain flour and sieve in the 1 tsp of bicarb. Stir to distribute the bicarb through the flour.
9. Once the pan has been cooling for ten minutes, add the beaten medium egg to the sticky mixture and stir well, for 60 seconds or so. Adding the egg magically binds the split mixture together, leaving it smooth and glossy.
10. Pour the sticky egg-sugary-mixture into the flour bowl.
11. Mix for up to one minute, just enough to combine - you don't want any patches of flour left but also you don't want to over-mix and make tough biscuits.
12. Put the dough into a tupperware box and chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours, or else it is too sticky to work with (you can leave it in the fridge for up to 24 hours if you need to). The dough will feel very firm when you take it out of the fridge - this is fine. It will be shapable once you've faffed around weighing it.
13. When you are ready to shape the biscuits, pre-heat the oven to a 180 C (160 C fan) or Gas 4.
14. Set aside two large baking trays. If you want to you can line them with reusable silicone liner - Lakeland sells this cut-to-size, good-quality, reusable baking-tray lining paper, or just leave them bare. I have found that using regular (thin and disposable) greaseproof paper can be a hindrance as the dough can stick to it during the shaping. The baked biscuits will come off an unlined (no need to grease or flour either) tray easily enough with a fish slice. Using the reusable liner means they come off very easily.
15. Using digital scales to help you, divide the dough into 16g lumps. Set aside the lumps on a couple of large plates until all twenty-six (approx.) have been weighed out.
16. Roll each lump in your palms (for about 10 seconds each), so you end up with 26 smooth balls.
17. Space the balls out on the lined baking trays.
18. Flatten each ball using a 7cm-diameter circular implement. The implement needs to be perfectly flat to ensure each biscuit is a uniform thickness. I use a metal 1/2 cup size measuring cup, repeatedly WIPED with a dry cloth and then dipped generously in plain flour (so it doesn't stick). Put the implement exactly on the centre of each ball of dough, and press down firmly, using a twisting motion - twist one way then the other way- until you see the dough just starting to appear from underneath it. Don't worry, the '1/2 cup' writing indents disappear during baking. Also don't worry if the biscuits look quite 'raggedy' and / or 'floury' at this stage, they will neaten up (shape and colour) during baking!
19. Bake for 15 minutes - swap the tray positions over in the oven partway though baking (so the top tray becomes the bottom tray), and at that point rotate the trays, (so the biscuits at the back of the oven are then near the door of the oven). This will give you a more even bake.
20. As soon as you remove the trays from the oven, use a fish slice to loosen the biscuits - this is an IMPORTANT step, or else they will cool onto the trays and break up when you do try to move them.
21. Then leave the (loosened) biscuits to cool for 5 minutes on the trays.
22. After that, use the fish slice to put them to cool fully on a wire rack or two, for 20 minutes (covered with a clean tea towel), before storing them in an airtight container for up to three days, or freezing them on the day of baking.
Adapted from this Pepparkakor recipe by Leyla Kazim of The Cutlery Chronicles.