Cardamom Biscuits Recipes

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350°. Cream butter, 1-1/2 cups confectioners' sugar, cardamom and salt until light and fluffy. Beat in extract. Gradually beat in flour. Stir in walnuts., Shape dough into 1-in. balls; place 2 in. apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake until edges are golden, 15-17 minutes. , While warm, roll cookies in remaining confectioners' sugar. Cool on wire racks.

Steps:

• Rub the butter and flour together until it forms small breadcrumbs. Then add the caster sugar and ground cardamom. Beat the egg in a separate bowl and add 2 tablespoons of it to the dry ingredients (you can keep the rest of the egg for another recipe)
• Mix the ingredients together until they form a soft dough. Then wrap in cling film and chill in the fridge for around 30 mins.
• Once the dough has chilled roll out on a floured surface so that it is around half a cm thick and cut into rounds using a biscuit cutter. Place the biscuits on to a greased baking sheet (it should make around 12 biscuits) and bake at 180c for 10-15mins.
• Allow the biscuits to cool. I decided to ice mine using golden icing sugar and a little water. I waited until the biscuits were cold and then spread the icing on to them using a pastry brush to get a thin layer of glazed icing.

Steps:

• Split the cardamom pods and tip the seeds into a mortar, then grind to a powder with the pestle. Tip the flour, rice flour and cardamom powder into a food processor. Chop the butter into small pieces and add to the food processor with the orange zest. Pulse to a fine breadcrumb texture. Add the icing sugar and mix briefly, then add the egg yolk and 1-2 tsp cold water and pulse to a firm dough. Wrap and chill for 15 mins.
• Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Line 2 baking sheets with baking parchment. Roll out half the dough at a time and stamp out 8cm rounds or squares and transfer to the baking sheets. Gather up the trimmings and roll out again to make more biscuits. Use a cocktail stick to make a hole in each biscuit for hanging from the tree. Press a festive rubber stamp into the surface of each biscuit. Chill for 30 mins.
• Bake for 8-10 mins until just golden and crisp. Transfer to a wire rack and leave to cool.
• Dust each biscuit liberally with icing sugar, then brush off the excess from the surface, leaving a white imprint on each biscuit. Tie up with pretty ribbon or string and hang from your tree.

Steps:

• Put the butter and the flour in a large mixing bowl and rub together with your fingertips until the mixture looks like grainy sand.
• In another bowl, stir together the rest of the ingredients until smooth and runny. Pour over the butter and flour mixture and combine with your hands. When the dough is soft and squidgy, shape it into a ball, wrap it up in cling film and put it in the fridge for 20-30 mins to firm a little.
• Just before you remove the dough from the fridge heat your oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4 and line 2 baking sheets with baking parchment.
• Remove the dough from the fridge. Sprinkle some flour on your work surface and on a rolling pin then roll out the dough until it's about the thickness of a £1 coin.
• Use your ruler and a dinner knife to carefully cut the biscuit dough into rectangles that are 10cm long and 3cm wide and put them on the trays, leaving 2 fingers worth of space between each biscuit.
• Put the biscuits in the oven for 10-12 mins. Once baked, cool in the trays for a few minutes then carefully transfer to a wire rack until completely cool. Repeat until all the dough is used up.
• To decorate, melt the chocolate in the microwave then dip the end of each biscuit in the melted chocolate and leave to set on a plate or tray lined with baking parchment. Before the chocolate sets sprinkle them with a pinch of your favourite toppings then leave somewhere cool for 1-2 hrs. If giving as a gift, pack into little boxes once the chocolate is completely set (keeps for 2-3 days).

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 425°F. Combine first 6 ingredients in processor and mix. Add chilled butter and cut in using on/off turns until mixture resembles coarse meal. Transfer to large bowl. Beat eggs to blend in glass measuring cup. Add enough buttermilk to beaten eggs to measure 9 ounces (1 cup plus 2 tablespoons). Add vanilla. Using fork, mix buttermilk mixture into dry ingredients just until dough binds together.
• Gently knead dough on floured surface until it just hold together, about 10 turns. Divide dough into 3 equal pieces. Form one dough piece into ball and flatten to 1-inch-thick round. Cut into 4 wedges. Transfer to ungreased baking sheet, spacing evenly. Repeat forming and cutting with remaining 2 dough pieces.
• Brush biscuits with melted butter; sprinkle with sugar. Bake until just firm to touch and beginning to brown, about 15 minutes. Transfer biscuits to rack. (Can be prepred 8 hours ahead. Cool comletely. Wrap tightly in foil and store at room temperature. Before serving, rewarm in 350°F. oven about 5 minutes.)

Steps:

• Split the cardamom pods and remove the seeds. Pound the seeds to a powder in a pestle and mortar with 1 tsp of the sugar.
• Beat the butter until soft, then gradually add the remaining icing sugar and the ground cardamom. Continue beating until light and creamy, about 10 mins.
• Sieve the flour and gram flour into a bowl and whisk in the semolina and a pinch of salt. Stir into the butter and sugar in two increments. Gently bring everything together into a soft dough.
• Roll the dough into small, marble-sized balls with your hands and arrange, spaced out, on baking trays lined with baking parchment.
• Slightly flatten the top of each ball and press a whole almond or some chopped pistachios in the middle of each one. Chill for 20 mins.
• Heat the oven to 160C/140C fan/gas 3. Bake the biscuits for about 20 mins or until golden. Leave to cool before storing in an airtight tin.