Chocolate and Hazelnut Biscuits

Biscuits bought in a supermarket bear no resemblance to biscuits made at home with real butter and wholesome ingredients. These chocolate and hazelnuts biscuits take a little time to make but reward with multi-textural mouth feel, buttery crunchiness and the delight of dark chocolate.

Ingredients

125gms whole hazelnuts

200gms butter

200gms brown sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

1 egg

230gms self-raising flour

70gms plain flour

pinch of salt

50gms desiccated coconut

100gms dark chocolate buttons or bits.

Method

Set oven at 160C. Place the hazelnuts on a baking tray and bake for around 20 minutes until the skin blisters. Check the nuts occasionally and give the tray a shake to make sure they don't burn. Tip the hazelnuts into a clean tea towel and rub off the skin. Don't worry if some of the skin doesn't come off. Once cool, roughly chop the hazelnuts. (In half is fine.)

Increase the oven temperature to 180C.

In a large bowl cream the butter and sugar until fully combined and slightly fluffy. I do this by hand but it can easily be done in a bench mixer or a hand beater.

Add the vanilla essence and beat that in too.

Now beat the egg into the butter and sugar mix until just combined.

Stir the flours, salt and coconut in then add the chocolate and hazelnuts and mix until evenly distributed. Do this by hand. The dough is quite stiff.

Roll the dough into 30gm balls and place on a baking paper lined tray. Don't put them too close together as they will spread a little. I press the biscuits down very lightly with a fork but this is entirely optional.

Bake for approximately 20 minutes until a light golden colour. Remove immediately to a cooling rack as they may stick if left to cool on the baking tray.

When cool they can be stored in an airtight container. As long as you haven't eaten them all!