Social Kitchen

I don’t quite remember the first time I had digestive biscuits.  We often had different kinds of dipping biscuits with our tea in the morning.  But most of them were slightly cardboard-y, often flavorless, and just kind of meh.  Oh, I still had them, of course.  But it wasn’t like I thoroughly enjoyed them.

And then, at some point, digestives came into my life and my tea and biscuit experience completely changed.  These were slightly sweetened biscuits that were light and crumbly, not dense and snappy.  They held up to tea dipping, but they were also so delicious on their own.  I would have them spread with Nutella, or dipped in cold milk, or warm milk, or just plain.  And they’re not even called cookies, so you don’t feel bad having them at any time of day!

Slowly I converted my entire family to digestive biscuits.  Slowly, I started using digestives in my baking.  And slowly, the world became a happier place.

So, here we are, with another attempt of making store–bought treats homemade.  I’m not going to lie – these don’t take exactly like those that come in that enticing red sleeve.  The texture is more of a shortbread cookie, rather than a crumbly biscuit.  But they are still light and barely sweet, and these, too, hold up to tea dipping and Nutella spreading.  And that’s all you need for a glorious tea biscuit.

Homemade Digestive Biscuits (recipe adapted from Serious Eats)

1 cup old fashioned oats
1.5 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 stick unsalted butter, cold, and diced into cubes
1 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup milk
2 oz. dark chocolate

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

Place oats into a food processor and pulse until it becomes a fine powder.  Add the flour, salt, baking powder and powdered sugar and pulse a few more times until the dry ingredients are well blended together.

Add butter and let the food processor run until the butter becomes pea-sized and the mixture resembled coarse sand.  Add the milk and pulse together until the dough comes together in a ball.

Lightly flour a surface.  Dump the dough out and press together until it is a disc.  Roll out the dough until it is about 1/8 inch thick.  Prick the entire surface with a fork.

Using a biscuit cutter, cut out circles and place them on prepared baking sheets.  Re-roll scraps and keep cutting until all of the dough has been used.  Bake for 20 minutes, or until golden brown.  Let cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes and then let cool completely on wire rack.

If desired, melt the chocolate in the microwave in 30 second intervals, stirring after each interval.  Dip the non-pricked side of the digestive into the chocolate, using a butter knife to help with even spreading.  Place the digestive on the wire rack to let the chocolate cool completely.

This entry was posted on January 22, 2014 at 10:03 am and is filed under Uncategorized.