Florentines, S1E2-Technical Challenge — The Great Informal Baker

These Florentines were as delicious as they were tedious to make.

These little beauties are simultaneously chewy and crispy, super fun treat!

Once again, I found myself googling things in the grocery store & driving to multiple stores searching for elusive British ingredients. This time it was golden syrup and candied peel. After three stores, I gave up and decided to make my own.

I found a simple candied orange peel recipe here. I made the candied orange peel and the golden syrup a day ahead of time.

Extra steps aside, both of these are very simple to make. Golden syrup is a lot like a standard simple syrup, its just cooked longer and caramelized. I ended up making these cookies with dried cranberries but you can also use candied cherries. If I … — Extra steps aside, both of these are very simple to make. Golden syrup is a lot like a standard simple syrup, its just cooked longer and caramelized. I ended up making these cookies with dried cranberries but you can also use candied cherries. If I make these again I will definitely be making my own candied cherries. See my cherry almond cake post if you're interested in seeing candied cherries. I can candy ALLLLLL the fruits!

After my orange peel dried out for a day, I measured all my ingredients and got ready for the bake.

I lifted the Florentine recipe itself straight from the PBS website. Once all the ingredients were measured out, I melted the butter, syrup and sugar together in a pan over low heat. I then removed them from the heat and added the flour mixture to that. If the detail on how to compose this dough was missing from the instructions on the show, I wouldn't have known what to do. I would have been sitting there trying to cream my butter and sugars together.

So below you see the batter scooped out and then as they bake they do spread out quite a bit and get their nice, lacy appearance.

Confession: I once made brownies with some friends and we thought wax paper could substitute for parchment paper. Spoiler. It cannot.

While the cookies cooled, I tempered the chocolate.

I saved the leftover golden syrup and simple syrup left behind from my candied orange. I baked a few more times with them and added them to mimosa drinks instead of my plain simple syrups!

This is my Aussie Shepherd, Olive. She keeps me company while I'm up late baking-usually waiting for me to inevitably drop something tasty.

Tada! Aren't these pretty? They're that little something extra kind of cookie. Pretty presentation and honestly not too difficult to make. Aside from pre-making the candied fruits and syrup, time wise these wouldn't have been too excessive.

And the original recipe didn't call for eggs, so for once I wasn't substituting!

Recipe:

Preheat Oven to 350F

Ingredients

50g butter
50g demerara sugar (confession, I used turbinado sugar-another ingredient I had a hard time finding)
50g golden syrup
50g flour
25g dried cranberries or glacé cherries, finely chopped
50g candied peel, finely chopped
25g almonds, finely chopped
25g walnut pieces, finely chopped
200g plain chocolate (70% cocoa solids)

Preheat the oven to 350F. Line three baking trays with baking parchment or silicon sheets.
Measure the butter, sugar and syrup into a small pan and heat gently until the butter is melted. Remove from the heat and add the flour, chopped cranberries or cherries, candied peel and nuts to the pan. Stir well to mix.
Make 18 florentines by spooning six teaspoonfuls of the mixture on to each of the prepared baking trays, leaving plenty of room for them to spread during cooking.
Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until golden-brown. Leave the florentines to cool before lifting onto a cooling rack using a palette knife
Set a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, without letting the bowl touch the water. Temper the chocolate by breaking half of the chocolate into the bowl. Stir until the chocolate reaches a melting temperature of 53C/127F. Meanwhile, finely chop or grate the remaining chocolate.
Carefully remove the bowl from the pan, add the rest of the chocolate and stir gently until the chocolate has cooled to 26C/79F.
Spread a little melted chocolate over the flat base of each florentine and leave to cool slightly before marking a zigzag in the chocolate with a fork. Leave to set, chocolate side up on a cooling rack. Store in an airtight container.

One more shot of these beauties. Yummmmmmy