Makes about 12
Preparation time 10 minutes, plus cooling time
Baking time 12-15 minutes
You need
• 170 g softened butter
• 1 cup caramel sugar
• 1 egg
• 3 ml vanilla essence
• 2 cups cake flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 2 tablespoons custard powder
• 70 g chocolate, chopped very finely (or grated)
• melted chocolate and ice cream, to serve
Here's how
1 Cream the butter and sugar together until the mixture is a light colour - use a wooden spoon or an electric mixer. Mix in the egg and vanilla essence. Sieve the flour, baking powder and custard powder into the mixture and add the chocolate. Mix the ingredients with your hands until you have a smooth dough. Shape the dough into a flat disc, cover it with wax paper and put it in the fridge for half an hour.
2 Preheat the oven to 180 °C. Dust a clean work surface with flour and roll the dough out until it's about 5 mm thick. Use a palette knife to loosen the dough from the work surface before cutting out dough circles big enough to cover the outside of the muffin pan.
3 Grease the underside of a muffin pan with cooking spray and shape the cut circles carefully over the mould, pressing down to form a smooth surface. (I used a cookie cutter with a 12 cm diameter, but you can use any size as long as your circles fit over the cups.)
4 Bake the biscuits for 12 - 15 minutes or until cooked. Let them cool down before you carefully lift them off the muffin cups and onto a cooling rack to set.
5 Brush melted chocolate on the inside of the cups (this will prevent them from becoming soggy) and serve with your favourite ice cream.
Tip
The chocolate splinters need to be as finely chopped as possible. Bigger pieces of chocolate will melt and cause the cups to crack in the oven.
If you don't have time to make cups, use the dough to make balls. Put the balls on a baking sheet and flatten them with a fork before baking.
