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Iced Christmas Biscuits

Christmas biscuits

When a Biscuiteer catalogue arrived through my letterbox I was enchanted by the beautifully crafted iced Christmas biscuits.

Inspired by the colourful collections I decided to set about making my own.

The first challenge I encountered was to source some cookie cutters. Scouring the shelves of my local hardware shop I found this box of Stehkekse pastry cutters.

My joy at finding these delightful “stand-up” characters was further confounded when I realised that the price had been reduced!

It was only when I unpacked the box at home I realised that the “easy recipes” were not included. Mmmm… maybe that’s why they were on sale!?

Cookie cutters
Cookie cutters

Not to be defeated I retrieved a biscuit recipe that I had saved from December 2008! There was nothing to stop me now.

I purchased the relevant ingredients and got to work.

Ingredients

For the biscuits

  • 350g plain flour
  • 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • 2tsp ground ginger
  • 2 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 100g butter cut into pieces
  • 175g lighting muscovado sugar
  • 1 large egg beaten
  • 4 tbsp golden syrup

For the decoration

  • icing sugar
  • food colouring
  • edible gold or silver coloured balls
  • ribbon or Baker’s twine

Method

  1. Preheat the oven to 190°C/170°C fan/375°F/gas 5
  2. Put the flour, bicarbonate of soda, ginger and cinnamon in a bowl
  3. Rub in the butter so the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs
  4. Stir in the sugar, add the egg and syrup and mix to form a dough
  5. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead to bring the dough together
  6. Roll out each batch with a lightly floured rolling pin to an even thickness of about 5mm
  7. Create shapes with the biscuit cutters
  8. Make a hole in the top of each with a skewer if you want to hang the biscuits as decorations
  9. Place on a greased baking try and bake for about 10 minutes
  10. Remove and allow to cool on a wire rack

To make the icing

  • Add water to the icing sugar and mix to a smooth consistency
  • Ice biscuits using a piping bag for simple decorative lines and edgings
  • Add a drop of food colouring to separate batches to make contrasting details

To finish

  • Before the icing sets add the edible balls as eyes or buttons
  • Place a biscuit support under each biscuit if you wish them to stand up
  • Alternatively, reopen any holes that have closed during baking to allow for ribbon or twine to be attached
  • Store in a biscuit tin or a glass Kilner jar, or hang as decorations
Christmas biscuits
Christmas biscuits

The end result was definitely not a patch on the Biscuiteer‘s seasonal fare but they looked very pretty and tasted absolutely delightful.

They certainly went down well with the guests, and I don’t mean just the children.

Top Tip

Use Baker’s twine or skinny ribbon to hang biscuits as decorations.

I cut-out the hanging ribbons from new jumpers as they are ideal for this purpose.

Happy Christmas!

📸 Carolyn Hayter

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