Nutmeg and custard cream biscuits

This is the recipe that leaped out at me from Marcus Wareing’s new book “Nutmeg and Custard”. Originally I planned to make only the biscuits to accompany a crème brulee dessert but then I figured that if I just made more biscuits I could sandwich some as per this recipe.

Creme brulee is an amazing dessert and you can find the recipe here.

This was my plan – to use the biscuits for scooping up crème brulee. It was a very good plan, if I say so myself:

Originally I intended to roll the biscuit dough out and use a cutter but it’s far too short to be able to do that – these biscuits are buttery! You have to make a sausage of the dough and chill it...

....before cutting into discs:

These never hardened to crisp biscuits, I think they’re just too buttery to do that. They are like extremely crumbly rich shortbread and quite beautiful!

When I tasted the buttercream as I was making it, I wasn’t that impressed as the use of custard powder made it grainy in a way that I couldn’t beat out. However, when sandwiched between the biscuits it was divine. It’s not a filling that I would use in other ways though i.e. on top of a cake – it’s best between biscuits.

Ingredients:

For the biscuits:
150g unsalted butter, at room temperature
40g icing sugar
2 tablespoons custard powder
165g plain flour
1 grated nutmeg

For the custard cream filling:
80g unsalted butter, at room temperature
75g icing sugar
2 tablespoons custard powder

Method

- Line a large baking tray with either baking paper or non-stick foil.

- Start by making the biscuit dough: Cream together the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.

- Stir in the flour and custard powder until a dough forms – this will be sticky and extremely soft.

- On a sheet of clingfilm roll the dough into a sausage shape approximately 4cm in diameter.

- Wrap in the clingfilm and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

- Preheat the oven to 165°C/fan oven 145°C/325°F/Gas mark 3.

- Cut the chilled dough into 24 slices (well, this is what you’re aiming for but I only got about 16) and lay them on the baking sheet. They will expand a bit on baking so place them about 1.5cm apart. Use two baking sheets if necessary.

- Grate the nutmeg all over the biscuits.

- Bake for 15-20 minutes until the biscuits are golden.

- Leave the biscuits to cool on the tray – they are very soft on coming out of the oven.

- Now make the filling: beat all the ingredients together until smooth and well combined.

- When the biscuits are cold sandwich them together with the filling.

- Store for up to three days in an airtight tin.

- NB. You can also have the biscuits, without the filling, as an accompaniment to a dessert such as crème brulee

- Bask in the glory of the wonderful thing you have made.

- Eat.