Orange Pecan Biscuits
INGREDIENTS 113 grams softened butter 220 grams packed brown sugar 1 egg 1 tablespoon grated orange rind 1 teaspoon vanilla 218 grams plain flour ¼ teaspoon salt ½ teaspoon baking soda Baking soda 80 grams chopped pecans
INSTRUCTIONS
- Cream the butter and sugar together in a large bowl..
- Add the egg, and then the orange rind and vanilla. Set aside.
- Sift the flour, salt and baking soda into a medium bowl. Stir through the chopped pecans.
- Add the flour and pecan mixture to the creamed mixture and stir together very thoroughly.
- To form the dough into ‘logs’, take a large piece of greaseproof paper or baking parchment and sprinkle a little flour on it. Flour your hands a bit as well.
- Take half the dough and put it in the centre of the paper.
- Using the paper to help you, shape the dough into a log about 11 to 12 inches (28 to 30 centimetres) long.
- Repeat with another piece of paper and the rest of the dough.
- Wrap the paper or baking parchment tightly round each log of dough.
- Place the dough logs in a bag and put them the refrigerator for at least 6 hours or overnight.
- The next day, either freeze the dough, or bake it from chilled.
- When you want to bake the frozen or chilled dough, preheat the oven to about 180C (160℃ for a fan oven).
- Remove the dough logs from the fridge or freezer. You might want to give the logs a bit of a roll on the counter before you open up the paper just to round the edges. Sometimes the bottom goes a bit flat when they sit in the fridge.
- If the logs are frozen leave them for five minutes or so before you attempt to slice them, unless you have very strong arms and a very sharp knife!
- Slice the logs about one quarter inch thick (about half a centimetre) and place on baking sheets.
- These biscuits don’t spread all that much, but be sure to space them at least an inch apart. Each log will make about 24 to 28 cookies depending on how thickly you slice them.
- Bake for 8 to 10 minutes from chilled (or 11 to 14 minutes from frozen) until they are lightly golden. It’s worth keeping an eye on them because they can suddenly brown up very fast.
- Remove the baking sheets from the oven and leave the biscuits to cool on the baking sheets for at least five minutes before carefully removing them from the baking sheets and cool on wire racks.