This year, Christmas was a little odd. I was working over some of Christmas day, so we went to visit my family the weekend before, and did some present swapping, relatives visiting, and of course some baking.

My Mum has been keeping an eye on my crafting and baking goings on via the blog, so requested we make some Chocolate and Caramel Chelsea Buns… so of course I obliged, but also I decided to try out making some savoury biscuits to make as a gift to take for my Aunt and her family when we stopped off on our way back home.

The recipe is from a book that I have been dying to make something out of for a while. Ideal opportunity!

Parmesan Hearts Recipe – taken from Biscuit by Miranda Gore Browne

Ingredients

100g plain flour

cayenne pepper

25g semolina (as I was at my Mum’s I didn’t put this in as she didn’t have any!)

100g unsalted butter, straight from the fridge

100g parmesan cheese, finely grated

2 egg yolks

1 tsp olive oil

1 tbsp milk

1 tbsp mixed seeds (optional)

Method

Sift the flour and a pinch of cayenne pepper into a large mixing bowl and stir in the semolina. Coarsely grate the butter into the bowl, then rub it in using your fingertips, or whizz in a food processor until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Stir in most of the parmesan, reserving some for sprinkling on top.

Put one egg yolk and the oil into a cup or small bowl and beat together, Add to the dry ingredients a little at a time, stirring together with a knife, or pulsing in the food processor. Bring together with your hands to form a flat disc, wrap tightly in cling film, and chill for at least 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/ Mark 4 and line two baking trays with non-stick baking paper.

Lightly flour a work surface and roll out the chilled dough to a thickness of about 3 mm. Using a cutter, stamp out shapes, and transfer them to the prepared baking trays spacing about 3cm apart.

Beat the remaining egg yolk with the milk and brush over the top of each biscuit. Sprinkle with the remaining parmesan, a few seeds if using and a dusting of cayenne pepper. bake for 8-10 minutes, until golden.

As you may be able to tell… these are not hearts! I decided to go for a slightly more festive shape and do some stars.

Allow to cool slightly on the trays, then transfer the biscuits to cooling racks.

Done!

I packaged mine, just simply, in a clip top jar.