Mini Empire Biscuits

Productive day today. Fixing computers, changing the oil and filters in two cars and making empire biscuits. Can't say I'm ever still enough to get bored!!

Back to college tomorrow, and taking in the mini empire biscuits for the troops (if Mrs B doesn't eat them all first!)

Recipe below if you're interested... (I used Jelly Tots instead of cherries)

Empire Biscuits
(Number of biscuits depends on the size of cutter and the thickness of the biscuits!)

Ingredients
8oz Butter (Softened, remove from fridge 1 hour before use)
4oz Castor Sugar
Few drops of Vanilla Essence
12oz Plain Flour
4oz Cornflour
½ Standard size jar Raspberry Jam
12oz Icing Sugar
3 tablespoons Water
Glace Cherries for decoration

Method
1. Heat the oven to Gas 2½ / 160 ̊C
2. Cream together the butter, sugar and vanilla.
3. Sieve the flours together, then mix into the butter mixture.
4. The resulting mixture will be quite crumbly
5. Press the mixture together, place on a clean worktop (do not use any additional flour), and flatten it out a little by hand.
6. Roll out the mix until about 8-10mm thick
7. Use a round cutter to cut biscuit shapes
8. Prepare a lightly greased baking tray
9. Carefully lift the biscuits onto the tray with a flat knife. The biscuits should be close together but not touching.
10. Re-roll the off-cuts of pastry.
11. Bake the biscuits for about 20 minutes – they should not be allowed to brown much at all, as brown = burnt! They should be fairly firm to the touch and a very slightly tinged fawn colour.
12. Remove the biscuits from the tray and cool on a wire rack.
13. Place the jam in a small saucepan – heat and simmer for about 5 minutes (This helps the jam set better inside the biscuits.
14. Let the jam cool for a few minutes, then using a teaspoon, spoon and spread jam onto the back of one biscuit, then sandwich with another.
15. Leave the biscuits to cool.
16. Use a double saucepan for the icing (or just a small pan inside a bigger one with boiling water in between).
17. Add the icing sugar and water to the small pan. Mix and heat until smooth. Heating the icing ensures it cools and sets quickly and doesn’t run off the biscuits too much
18. The resulting icing should be thin enough to flow, but not too thin that it runs off the biscuits.
19. Dip the top of the biscuit (holding the bottom half) into the icing then it put back on the wire rack to cool
20. Alternatively spoon the icing over the biscuits on the wire rack.
21. Place half a glace cherry in the middle of the icing (before it sets!)