Choc Chip Biscuits

Hi, this recipe is from the Australian Women's Weekly 'Big Book of Kids Cooking' page 175. 

I made these biscuits for a bake sale that a few of my friends were putting on in aid of Children in Need. The recipe is super simple and I already had all of the ingredients at home, plus it made lots of biscuits quickly, so was perfect for the job.

I would say that this recipe is suitable for any level of cook, which makes it a particularly fun thing to bake with friends as none of you need to be experts. It can also be adapted to suit your favourite tastes like: oat and raisin biscuits (stir in 100g raisins and 1/2 cup of oats to the batter) or add a selection of chopped nuts or marshmallows or chopped fruit like cherries or blackberries. It's completely up to you!

Lastly, these are more of a crunchy biscuit than a soft American-style cookie, but this does not detract from the flavour at all.

Enjoy!

Hazel :)

Dietary Info:

-Unsuitable for Vegans

{In place of the butter, use a vegan alternative butter or margarine. They will all work fine. For the egg, use a chia / flax egg: 1 tbsp chia seeds and 2.5 tbsp water, leave to soak and thicken before adding to the dish.}

-Vegetarian

-Contains Dairy

{Use a dairy-free butter or margarine alternative.}

-No Nuts (except nutmeg)

-Contains Gluten

{Use a gluten free plain flour alternative or blend up some oats to create oat flour or use ground almonds (although I would be tempted to only use up to half quantity of flour of almonds, so 130g oat flour : 130g ground almonds). Be aware you may need more liquid as g-f flours tend to absorb more than wheat flours, so add a splash of milk if necessary.}

-Pudding

-Snack

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Prep: 20 mins {This may take longer if your dough is as sticky as mine was and needed extra time dealing with it and adding extra flour.}

Bake: 15 mins

Makes: 30 small cookies

Ingredients:

-200g butter, softened {I used Clover margarine and it worked well. However, the dough was a bit sticky with it, so extra flour was needed.}

-1/2 tsp vanilla extract

-160g (1 cup) icing sugar

-1 egg

-95g (1/2 cup) dark chocolate chips {To save money, I chopped up a 100g bar of Molly's Chocolate into chunks. This is much cheaper than buying chocolate chips.}

 

-260g (1 and 3/4 cups) plain flour {I needed extra flour as my dough was way too wet and wouldn't roll into balls.}

-1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

-1 tbsp caster sugar

-2 tsp ground nutmeg {I used 4 tsp of mixed spices from Tesco: cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, pimento, coriander seed and ginger.}

-2 tsp ground cinnamon

Method:

1: Preheat the oven to moderately low: 170°C / 150°C fan / Gas 3 / 340°F. Grease two baking trays; line with baking parchment. {I needed an extra baking tray, although this wasn't filled up completely. Also, if you have reusable baking paper, you can use it here.}

2: Beat the butter, vanilla extract, sifted icing sugar and egg in a small bowl {I used a large bowl as it makes quite a lot of dough, so your normal mixing bowl will be fine.} with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. {I used a wooden spoon and it was fine.} Transfer to a medium bowl; stir in the chocolate chips and then the sifted flour and bicarbonate of soda, in two batches. {I did just one batch. I found my dough was quite sticky though, so I did add extra flour.}

3: Roll level tablespoons of dough into balls {If your dough is sticky, it is easier just to eyeball it rather than measure 1 tbsp of dough each time as it just gets messy. After rolling in the sugar mix, they do become much less sticky.} and then roll the balls in a mixture of caster sugar, nutmeg and cinnamon. 

4: Place the balls on the prepared trays 3 cm apart {Gently flatten with your palm.} and bake for about 15 mins. 

5: Cool the cookies on wire racks. 

While you're here...

I have a Pinterest for all my recipes, where you can save them to boards for the future and categorise them into different types of recipe e.g Sunday Dinners, picnic ideas etc. My account is @hazellikestocook, or find the link below. Also, I have a whole blog post explaining this in more detail here and https://hazelscookingandbakingblog.blogspot.com/2021/02/pinterest.html. 

https://pin.it/5xDvARk - my profile

This recipe:

https://pin.it/5GRcOB7