Chocolate Toffee Oatmeal Biscuits

Wotchers!

Sometimes you come across a recipe that sounds interesting but when you make it, you think to yourself: this isn’t great, but IT CAN BE!

So it is with this week’s recipe.

A bit of background. I found a thread on t’Internet about a favourite confectionery company in the US (See’s), and someone posted a PDF of one of their cookie recipes. I thought: this sounds like something tasty, so I downloaded it and decided to give it a try. A slight problem was, it utilised one of said favourite confectionery’s chocolate-coated products, which wasn’t available here in the UK, so I made what I thought might be a close approximation (Russian Toffee over on DejaFood.uk) and added some chocolate chips.

You did all make the Russian Toffee, didn’t you?

Didn’t you??

*crickets*

*tumbleweed*

OK, moving on…

Then came the baking. The recipe suggested a time range of 8-10 minutes, so rather than leave things to chance, I decided to do a mini test bake of 3 biscuits, and take one out at 8, 9, and 10 minutes to determine which texture I liked best – a top tip for any recipe you’re trying for the first time. Additionally, just to be difficult, I don’t actually like cakey/cookie-type biscuits: I prefer them to be crisp and crunchy. So instead of scooping balls onto the baking sheet, I used the scoop only as a measure of mixture, then squished them flat with the base of a cup.

This worked well in getting the texture I liked, but it was a bit Faffy™, so I evolved the method into rolling out the mixture into a flat sheet, and then using a pizza wheel to cut it into squares. Much easier. However, the lumps of toffee and chunks of chocolate made it a bit challenging to keep the edges neat and straight. Add to this the melting and spreading during baking of both the toffee and chocolate, and the finished biscuits were veering towards blobby freeform. So the third iteration of the method was to coat the toffee in chocolate (two-in-one), roll out the oat mixture into a sheet, then chop and sprinkle the chocolate-coated toffee onto the surface of the biscuit mixture and press in. Both still melt during baking, but in a more restrained way. The result can be seen in the image above.

The texture is crisp outside with a slightly soft chew. Very delicious. Very moreish.

In summary, I really like this recipe, even though I changed practically everything about it.

You can download the original See’s recipe here.

Gluten-free version
I thought it odd that the original recipe suggested gluten-free flour, but then listed regular oats, so I tried this recipe using both gluten-free oats AND (Doves Farm) gluten-free plain flour, keeping everything else the same. I’m happy to say that this works fantastically well whether you use a scoop to make cakey cookies or opt to roll the mixture out as in my adaptation. HOWEVER… There is one small change with the method and that is you MUST let the biscuits cool on the baking sheet completely before moving them to a cooling rack or storage: when just out of the oven they are too friable and will break apart if you try and move them while warm.

Chocolate Toffee Oatmeal Biscuits

You don’t have to make toffee if you don’t want to. Use your favourite chocolate-covered confectionery. Curly-Wurlys come to mind. Don’t be limited by toffee either – honeycomb or fudge would be equally delicious. I like the contrast and slight bitterness of plain chocolate, so you could even cover your favourite toffee or fudge with plain chocolate at home beforehand, or use milk chocolate for that super-sweet indulgence.

115g unsalted butter
100g plain/gluten-free flour
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
½ tsp salt
½ tsp ground cinnamon
100g soft dark brown/Muscovado sugar
50g white granulated sugar
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
135g rolled oats/gluten free rolled oats
100g chocolate-covered toffee/fudge/honeycomb – chopped
Sea salt to sprinkle on top (optional)

• Brown the butter. Put the butter in a small pan and melt over medium heat. Allow to bubble for a few minutes until you can smell a toasted aroma and the milk solids have caramelised to a golden-brown colour. Remove from the heat and allow to cool.
• Put the flour, bicarb, salt, cinnamon and sugars into a bowl and whisk together, being sure to break up any lumps in the brown sugar.
• Whisk the egg and vanilla together and mix with the cooled (but not solidified) browned butter.
• Pour the egg and butter mixture into the dry ingredients and stir to combined.
• Add the rolled oats and mix thoroughly.
• Roll out the mixture to a thickness of just under 1cm. Trim the edges and neaten into a rectangle.
• Scatter the chopped toffee pieces over the surface and  lightly roll with a rolling pin to press them into the biscuit mixture.
• Cut into 4cm squares and chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes.
• Heat the oven to 190°C / 170°C Fan and cover 2 baking sheets with baking parchment.
• Slide a palette knife or offset spatula under the now firm biscuits and transfer them to the baking sheets. Space them out (3cm) to keep them from flowing together during baking.
• Do a test bake if you like. I have tried them at 10, 11 & 12 minutes, and feel the texture after baking for 11 minutes is ideal.
• Sprinkle a little sea salt over the hot biscuits if liked, then allow to cool on the tins for 10 minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool completely. If making a gluten-free batch, allow to cool completely on the baking tins.
• Store in an airtight container.