Love and Liberty

I like Bourbon Creams. I’d not baked since school. In 2015 someone sent me a recipe for home-made bourbons. I don’t know where they found it, but it worked for me. I’ve baked them four times, and not only were none of them disasters, I thought they all tasted great (presentation could be better).

If you want to try them, here is the recipe for your baking / eating pleasure.



[Blasted Blogger is still not letting me upload pictures from my PC and I’ve had to faff around with my phone again. Grrr]


I’ve not baked these biscuits for a couple of years and, while enjoying polishing off some ASDA home-brand, regretted that I could do with some of the more special bourbon creams, but lacked the ingredients, willpower, ingredients, time, sweat and swearing to hand. Actually, no, I have enough of the swearing in stock, but despite TV chefs that’s not enough to create food on its own. But I mentioned this on Twitter this afternoon, and a friend asked about the recipe, so I thought – why not share it? That’s how I got it. I briefly considered a Twitter thread, but decided that if I were attempting to follow a recipe on a Twitter thread I would rapidly become frustrated and ask, ‘Why didn’t the silly sod just put it in a blog post?’

I very rarely cook from recipes, which is probably one of the reasons I don’t bake, because I’m aware enough that bodging something up with meat and veg to taste is qualitatively different from shoving ingredients in the oven and trusting to magic. But five years ago, in one of the periodic national baking fervours, I slightly regretted not being a baker but lacked the confidence to start. One kindly friend asked what sort of biscuits I liked, and sent me a fairly simple bourbons recipe. I’ve not baked it much, and I’ve not baked anything else, but these biscuits suited me.

A friend sent me this recipe, having found it somewhere else, so I can take no credit even on their behalf. That means this is not a story of a brilliant invention inspired by a life-changing event or an old family secret. There are no more anecdotes to get in the way of getting to the recipe. The only things of mine are a few notes you’ll see as you go along, because although whoever the recipe’s original author was wrote fairly straightforward instructions, I am the definition of an inexperienced baker and made several mistakes and discoveries which I hope will be useful to share.

Now to the useful bits!


Alex Note: This makes 20ish biscuits, depending on your rolling and slicing.

Top tips – I found that the whole process always took at least twice as long as I expected, and that the biscuits had to be rolled thinner and cut narrower than I expected. Every time. You will also find that your kitchen and potentially entire home will be covered in a delicious but choking patina of icing sugar.

Ingredients For the Bourbon Biscuits

• 100g butter, softened


• 75g light muscovado sugar


• 25g caster sugar


• 2 tablespoons golden syrup


• 220g plain white flour


• 50g cocoa powder


• 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda


• Pinch of salt


• 3 tablespoons milk

Ingredients For the Bourbon [Butter-]Cream

• 100g butter, softened


• 175g icing sugar


• 2 tablespoons cocoa powder


• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Preparing and Baking the Bourbon Biscuits

Preheat the oven to 170C/335F/Gas Mark 3.

Line two baking trays with baking parchment.

Cream together the butter and the muscovado and caster sugars for 2-3 minutes, until pale and fluffy.

Beat in the golden syrup.

Then sift in the flour, cocoa, bicarbonate of soda and salt, and beat together.

Add the milk, a little at a time, to make a smooth dough.

Place the dough between two large pieces of clingfilm and roll out to a large rectangle, 3-4mm thick.

Cut into 6x3cm rectangles.

Alex Note: I recommend closer to 6cm by 2cm for the ‘proper Bourbon’ proportions. They expand, so find your preference by trial and error.

If you’re after neat, ideal bourbons with a biscuit snap, always roll them thinner and cut them narrower than you expect, then put them on the trays with plenty of space about them.

If you prefer a thicker, less shaped, more cookie style of biscuit, roll them slightly thicker and cut them slightly wider (or prepare with a little more bicarb), and don’t worry about them rising into one another.

Then transfer to the baking trays.

Use a wooden skewer to mark out rows of dots along the length of each biscuit.

Alex Note: This is of course only for presentation. But just so you know, the ‘proper Bourbon’ is two neat rows of five dots. If you’ve cut them shorter, the five will cram together and merge on baking, so do four dots and no-one will notice even if you’re aiming for super-regular bourbon creams.

I used the round base of the wooden skewer, as that makes nice regular dots like Lego, which keeps the shape much better than a sharp pin-prick.

Also sprinkle sugar – bigger crystals look better – lightly across the top, as the embedded crystals look impressive when cooked in.

If, on the other hand, you’re just going to eat them rather than them show them, don’t bother as it’s a bit of a faff. And – full disclosure – I’ve never bothered carving “BOURBON” into the surface of each one, so all my biscuits will have been failed as proper Bourbons.

Bake for 10 minutes, then remove from the oven.

Leave to cool on the tray for five minutes.

Alex Note: I recommend carefully sliding them – still on the parchment so as not to disturb them – onto a cooler surface, as the tray will still be very hot and if you start moving them onto the wire rack while they’re still too warm and soft they often tear apart.

Then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Preparing the Bourbon [Butter-]Cream Filling

Cream the butter for two minutes until fluffy.

Sift in the icing sugar and cocoa and beat slowly until combined.

Add the vanilla extract and beat until smooth.

The Miraculous Alchemy that is the Complete Bourbon Cream Biscuit

Spoon or pipe a thick line of buttercream down the middle of one biscuit.

Alex Note: Or just spread a load with a knife. I’m no good at neat thick lines, so this gives more control.

The quantities specified make quite a bit of buttercream, so you can be quite generous with it. Sometimes I’ve worried I might run out and been left with lots of buttercream at the end. Re-opening the biscuits to add more tends to break them (whatever filling is in there will be quite an effective adhesive once set), so what to do if you have too much spare buttercream and someone might walk into the kitchen and catch you just eating it by the spoonful?

My recommendation is to roll the spare buttercream into little balls, roll your balls in the muscovado sugar to cover them lightly, and tell everyone you absolutely meant to make little truffles too and it was in no way a mistake.

Sandwich together with a second biscuit.

Repeat until all the biscuits are filled.

The biscuits will keep in an airtight container for 3-4 days.

Alex Note: Yeah, right. Only if you padlock it and give someone else the key.

I hope you enjoy the biscuits, and if you wish to know where to send me some in an airtight container for express delivery within 2-3 days, please use the email address in the sidebar.

Labels: Biscuits, Bourbon Creams, Food, Recipes

In confessional mood and having earlier made an unkind reference to Mr Dave ‘Balloon’ Cameron’s cocaine use, I should declare my own addictive behaviour. Regular readers know this involves food. I may mock the influence of advertising, but actually I’m a sucker for certain types of it. First, there’s the Mae West principle: “When choosing between two evils, I always like to try the one I've never tried before”. A new flavour to try? Get it now! And my reaction to Cadbury’s withdrawing chocolate bars for salmonella: “Lots of chocolate on the telly! I must buy some.” And I did.

I do eat an awful lot of chocolate, but I don’t want you to get the impression I skimp on the savouries. One of the few times I’ve been out and sociable in the last few weeks was Saturday, when we were celebrating the thirtieth birthday of multi-talented author / producer of Doctor Who books and audio plays Simon Guerrier, a terribly nice chap with a terribly readable blog. He’s also Millennium’s foremost celebrity fan, and the elephant has a picture of him here, along with the latest of Richard and I (awwhh) and, of course, Millennium. If you think you’ve seen Simon before, it’s possible you’re confusing him with the younger son (if you respectably double his age) in BBC1’s current all-purpose-repeat-slot-filler of choice, My Family. But don’t mention that to Simon. Anyway, where was I? If you thought my blog meandered under normal circumstances, this is me after staying up late for by-elections. The point I was going to make was that, as usual, Richard had to physically separate me from the buffet and a truly magnificent chocolate cake, though when I filled an entire large plate with snacks it was in fact to distribute them to people in Simon’s study and make sure all his books were covered with the sort of greasy fingermarks I’d be aghast at if some dreadful guest did the same to us. Honest.

Another bad habit is to be found at Canary Wharf where – living on the lower east side of the Isle of Dogs – I frequently find myself changing trains. Along the way, I frequently pass The Square Pie Shop. Now, I’m particularly keen on a good pie, and while these are expensive, they are extraordinarily tasty (I’d recommend the Lamb and Rosemary, which is the only fast food I know that tastes like a really good bit of lamb). Every month they have a speciality pie, and I can never resist trying it. When I last visited, I saw something truly appalling instead: thirty-two limited edition pies for the World Cup. Now, normally I’d not touch anything to do with the football, but sod that! Fortunately they didn’t stock the entire set, or I might have ordered the lot. Just to taste. The two I took were bad enough (or, I should say, good enough. Mmmm). I’ve had to go a different route since, as I simply don’t trust myself.

Incidentally, one of the joys of shopping at Thornton’s – er, not that I do, often – is that it tends to be staffed by friendly and slightly rounded people with whom you can have a sensible conversation about chocolate. I wanted to know what was in one of the pies they had on display at Square Pie last week; “I don’t know,” said the assistant. “We’re not allowed to taste them.” The fiends! Still, it solves the riddle of how it’s staffed by such unfeasibly slim people.

Regular readers will also know that I have a long-term health problem and, with crushing inevitability, it is of course stomach-related. So eating too much is rarely good for me, I know certain foods will make me ill (while many others just surprise me), and when I’m ill and can’t get out, naturally I feel low, and you can guess what I do to cheer myself up. Well, exactly. The very definition of a vicious circle. Incidentally, while I sometimes wouldn’t mind losing a stone or two (if I don’t get out, I don’t get exercise), I did find my first ever TV interview on an old VHS a couple of months ago and, seeing myself underweight, rather than pining for a lost flat stomach, recoiled with a cry of “Oh, my god, it’s Skeletor!” So while I’ve lost count of the bizarre diets I’ve tried, weight loss isn’t my priority. If it’s yours, first I’d suggest getting down to a nudist beach and relaxing with people who won’t be nasty about your body shape, but I’ll also note that the only one that did sharply cut my weight down was the Atkins; though as it made me no more settled, made my skin even worse than usual and meant a month without chocolate, that’s not happening again in a hurry.

Anyway, while things are unpleasant, inconvenient and seemingly never-ending, though fortunately not ‘serious’, it’s something I’ve mostly avoided blogging about, because it’s just beyond embarrassing. However, as the last few weeks have been particularly bad and I’ve been particularly unsociable, I thought I should say why. It really started when I was stuck at home instead of being able to get to the big Ming speech three weeks ago, and was in such a frustrated grump I’ve still not blogged about it. However, I’ve been feeling for the last week that I should get back on the treadmill, particularly after breaking cover and raising blood pressure by posting on Paul Walter’s impressive and intimidatingly prolific blog to help him fisk the loathsome Ann Atkins (a diet people throughout the land find impossible to swallow [groan]). Possibly helped by listening to lots of very loud ELO to raise my level of perk (thank you, Doctor Who), though it’s entirely accidental that Evil Woman now blasts out of the flat when a certain ‘Thought For the Day’ presenter is announced.

Anyway, on a lighter note, here’s a summery recipe you can try at home. Having already changed the habit of a lifetime and referred to the World Cup, despite having even less interest in Wimbledon (the ads for that don’t even have cool CGI or a groovy song by the Who, though admittedly after those the football itself is bound to be an even bigger let-down) I’d like to offer you a carefully measured and calorie-controlled recipe involving strawberries and cream:

Pulverise a load of strawberries
Pour them into a bowl
Add a large container of natural yoghurt
Add a large container of cream
Stir briskly (or whisk)
Add copious quantities of icing sugar and stir in to taste. You might be surprised at how much it’ll take (and, careful - it billows up into the air like smoke, and asphyxiating on icing sugar is an embarrassing way to go)
Serve.

Yes, I know; very sugary, not very precise quantities. But it’s very easy, tastes jolly nice, and you can pretend it's a healthy yoghurt if anyone asks.

Labels: Blogs, Chocolate, Food, Health, Music, Personal, Radio, Recipes, Religion, The Today Programme