GBBO inspired Ginger and Pecan Florentines

Like many people, I'm sure, I was inspired by 'biscuit week' to make some Florentines but having never made them before, I wasn't quite sure where to start.  Then on Twitter, up popped this recipe

http://www.waitrose.com/content/waitrose/en/home/recipes/recipe_directory/g/ginger_pecan_florentines.html?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=florentines&stop_mobi=yes

from Waitrose.  Now, ginger is one of my favourite flavours and I also love pecans so thought I'd give it a crack!  Also, I have tried really hard this time to think more about and improve my photos, see what you think!  It is quite a time consuming recipe but the end product is definitely worth it (I am eating one as I type!)

So I followed the recipe on the Waitrose website with just one addition which was a couple of drops of my new ginger extract to boost the flavour...

I started by making sure the pecans and ginger were chopped ready to go and the raisins measured out too.  This was so as not to get in a muddle later on! (It paid off!)

  

I used my pampered chef crinkle cutter which worked really well, much easier to control and monitor the size of pieces!

 

So with everything ready to go I melted the butter and sugar together - always a bit dubious with this sort of thing as I have a tendency to burn things like this!  All went smoothly, though I did put a timer on for the 1 minute bubbling to make sure!

 

Having everything ready to go in was very helpful and I put in my ginger extract followed by the nuts, raisins and ginger.  After a good mix I dolloped onto the baking tray.  As they were quite small dollops I thought I had left plenty of room for spreading but as you can see...this wasn't the case!  Don't panic if this happens though...I just reshaped as soon as they came out of the oven before they set!  I cooked half on a normal baking tray and half on my baking stone - these ones took about 5-8 minutes longer so you just need to keep checking on them!

 

After about 5 minutes they are set enough to transfer to a cooling rack but again you might have to judge this!  Here is where you need some patience!  Leave them to cool completely before melting your chocolate.  I think this is definitely a recipe where it is worth spending a little more on top quality chocolate.  When chocolate has melted, wait again for it to cool a little before spreading onto the bottom of the Florentines.  Then wait again a couple of minutes before using  a fork to create a wavy pattern.  Then wait again for the whole thing to finish setting before turning over, packaging for gifts, or eating!

 

  

Bingo-wing-busting Gluten-free Strawberry shortbread sandwich!

After accidentally double-buying strawberries I was looking for a non-jam related way of using them up and came across this recipe for shortbread (which I love) with an intriguing technique - that's the bingo-wing-busting bit!

http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Hungarian-Shortbread

For the gluten-free bit I just substituted gluten-free self raising flour which seemed to work fine!  As this calls for cup measurements, I used my pampered chef dry measure which works brilliantly in these situations!

After creaming the butter for AGES I added the sugar and egg yolks and beat well again.  

I then slowly added in the gluten-free flour and blended.  I then packaged the dough up in two batches and put in the freezer.

Now comes the bingo-wing-busting bit....you have to grate the first half into the tin and press down then top with the filling - here is where I used the sliced strawberries rather than the jam filling in the original recipe.  Make sure to leave about 2cm boarder with now filling so it doesn't burn.

Then grate the second batch of dough over the top (maybe after a little rest for the burning arm!) and bake.

As I'm a little out of practice at the whole blogging thing I totally forgot to take a photo of the shortbread sliced but it was really delicious! Definitely one for a plate and fork though, quite crumbly texture due to the grating and the gluten free flour - would make a great pudding I think!