White Chocolate Dipped Honey Orange Oatmeal Biscuits

Autumn is officially here and as always, right on schedule, I’ve gone and caught a terrible case of the baking bug, particularly on a Tuesday night, 8pm to be precise. Such is the influence of the Great British Bake Off- by the time an episode finishes I’m mentally brain storming my own version of the signature bake. By the end of the working week, I’ve baked and photographed it- call it an annual ritual if you will. Or a mum of two with evidently too much time on her hands!

The show kicked off with biscuits so this is my take on biscuit week, inspired by my holiday in Cyprus. Traditional Greek and Cypriot desserts almost always include flavours like orange, honey and nuts so I thought why not create a biscuit with all 3 of those components! They’re so delicious and you can store them for a good 10 days in an airtight container so they’re long lasting too- result.

Happy baking!

Makes 12-14 biscuits

Difficulty: 1/5

Prep time: 40 minutes

Total time: 1 hour

For the Biscuits:

75g rolled oats, slightly pulsed in a food processor

75g plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

50g caster sugar

2 tbsp runny honey

1 tbsp freshly squeezed orange juice

Zest of a small orange

75g butter, melted

To Decorate:

150g white chocolate

1/4 tsp orange extract

Handful of shelled pistachios, slightly pulsed in a food processor

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C fan and line a large baking tray with parchment. In a medium sized bowl whisk together oats, flour, caster sugar and baking powder and set aside. In a smaller bowl combine butter, orange juice, orange zest and honey. Pour into the dry ingredients and mix until well combined.

2. Place the mixture onto the right hand side of a large sheet of parchment and fold the left hand side of parchment over it, covering the dough. Using a rolling pin, evenly roll out the mixture to about half a cm thickness and refrigerate for a minimum of 30 minutes (I put mine in the freezer for 15 minutes and it firmed up nicely!). Once firm and cold, remove from the fridge and use a round cutter to cut out the biscuits, re-rolling the off cuts until all the dough is used up. Bake for 12 minutes in the middle shelf until golden brown. Leave to cool on the baking tray for 5 minutes before placing the biscuits on a cooling rack with parchment paper underneath (it’s about to get a little messy!)

3. Melt the white chocolate over a double boiler until smooth and runny. Take off the heat and stir in the orange extract. Dip the cooled biscuits halfway into the chocolate and place back onto the wire rack before sprinkling with pistachios. Allow the chocolate to set and store in an airtight container/ biscuit tin.

4. Enjoy!

#oatmeal