Recipes

"These addictive biscuits are drizzled with hot caramel, so you can explore your artistic side when it comes to decorating them! With a generous dose of crystallized ginger and bit of chilli heat, they are not for the faint-hearted".




Makes about 15

    50 g unsalted butter, at room temperature
    100 g golden caster sugar
    1 egg
    50 g crystallized ginger, finely chopped
    130 g plain flour
    11⁄2 teaspoons baking powder
    2 teaspoons ground ginger
    Chilli caramel
    100 g golden caster sugar
    a pinch of ground cayenne pepper or hot chilli powder (or more if you like
    the heat!)
    1–2 baking trays, lined with greaseproof paper

Method

Preheat the oven to 160C (325F) Gas 3.

Cream the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Add the egg and mix well, then stir in the crystallized ginger. Mix the flour, baking powder and ground ginger in a separate bowl, then gently fold into the wet ingredients.

Take a generous teaspoon of the dough and place on one of the prepared baking trays. Flatten it slightly, then repeat this process with the remaining dough, spacing the dough balls well apart as they will spread when they are baking.

Bake in the preheated oven for about 25 minutes, or until the biscuits are golden. Remove from the oven and leave to cool while you make the chilli caramel.

To make the chilli caramel, put the sugar in a heavy-based saucepan over medium heat. The sugar can burn quite easily (which can render the caramel bitter), so stir it often and keep a close eye on it. After a few minutes, the sugar should have completely melted. Remove from the heat and stir in the pepper or chilli powder. Be very careful when handling caramel as it can easily burn you. Use it immediately before it starts to harden.

Using a spoon, drizzle the caramel over the biscuits any way you like. The caramel sets extremely quickly. When it has set, remove the biscuits from the tray. Store in an airtight container for up to 1 week, but be warned that the caramel can seep into the biscuits in particularly humid conditions.

This recipe comes from Popina Book of Baking by Isidora  Popovic (Ryland Peters & Small), with a foreword by our very own Henrietta Green. Photography by Peter Cassidy, copyright of Ryland Peters & Small.