Preparation
Sieve the plain flour. With a pestle and mortar crush to a fine powder the cardamom pods. Dice the cold butter. Finely zest the oranges.
Method
- 1 Heat the oven to 180°C/160°C fan/gas 4 and line 2 baking sheets with baking parchment.
- 2 In a food processor, pulse the flour, cardamom and icing sugar once or twice to combine.
- 3 Tip in the butter and pulse until the mixture looks like fine breadcrumbs.
- 4 Add the zest, yolk and water, then pulse again until a dough forms.
- 5 On a lightly floured surface, gently press the dough into a flat disc.
- 6 Wrap it in clingfilm and chill for 20 minutes, or until firm enough to roll out.
- 7 Working on half the dough at a time, roll it out on a lightly floured surface to about 3mm thickness.
- 8 Use the dove cutter to stamp out biscuits, re-rolling the dough as necessary – you should get around 24 in total.
- 9 Lift them onto the baking sheets with a spatula, leaving about 2cm of space around each one.
- 10 Using a pencil, poke a hole in the biscuits for the hanging ribbon.
- 11 Put the baking sheets in the freezer for 10 minutes, to firm up the shapes.
- 12 Bake for 7-8 minutes until the biscuits are lightly golden around the edges, then remove from the oven and allow to cool on the baking sheets.
- 13 Re-make the hole while they are still warm and soft.
- 14 Break up the chocolate into a microwaveable bowl, then microwave in 20-second bursts until fully melted.
- 15 Spoon it into a small disposable piping bag (or small plastic sandwich bag), twist the top closed and snip off a corner.
- 16 Decorate the biscuits, using our picture as a guide if you like.
- 17 Thread the holes with raffia or ribbon, and hang from your tree.
- Average per serving
- Calories 127.0kCal
- Fat6.9g
- Saturated4.2g
- Salt0.01g
- Carbohydrates15.7
- Sugar6.9g
- Protein1.4g
- Fibre0.5g