Butter Biscuit

Ok...after trying to bake and grill all the frozen food and junk food, it finally occured to me that I have almost never tried to bake biscuits. I remember my grandma and mom trying to bake biscuits during summer holidays in our country home...Oh, what a horrendous task it used to be. In all that summer heat, I have seen them work their sweat out baking flour biscuits on an iron tawa with refined hot sand to keep the heat intact! From where did they derive all that enthusiasm to undergo such a grind and we being kids, hardly appreciated all the effort that went into making it.

Being the next generation of such lovely home makers, it would be such a shame if i do not even try my hands at baking those biscuits in my modern kitchen with built in conventional oven...so, I called home and got the recipe from Mom and referred to my cookery guru...Tarla Dalal for finer details...So, here goes the process...

Preparation time: 20 mins Cooking time: 20

mins Makes about 35 pieces

Ingredients

2 cups plain flour (maida/all purpose)

1/2 cup powdered sugar

170 grams of butter

a pinch of salt

essence of ur choice ( i used saffron and a dash of nutmeg)

Almonds or other Nuts/ fruits for topping

Preparation

- Soak the almonds in warm water for an hour. Peel the skin and halve them

- Sieve the flour

- Cream/beat the sugar and butter until it is light and creamy

- Add the food essence, salt and the flour. Mix slowly until they combine intoa soft dough

- Make big balls of the dough and roll then on a floured board to desired thickness. If u roll it too thin, it would become very crispy.

- Use cutters to cut them into desired shapes and place them on the greased cookie sheet.

- Brush the biscuits with egg white on top or if purely vegetarian brush the top lightly with water.

- Place the almond/cherry/other nuts on each biscuit.

- Sprinkle little sugar on top and bake them

- Bake them at 400 deg F on the top rack and check every 5 mins.

- In 10 mins the sides and corners start browning. This will be the idealtime to remove them and let them cool before removing from tray.