Shortbread

One of the duties of the middle aged man is to express their incredulity about things too inconsequential to trouble others. The reducing dimensions of the Wagon Wheel; the demise of cardboard strip supporting the two squat logs of Bounty Bar; people having their phone on full in public; John Redwood.

Today I am incredulous that somewhere out there a person keeps naming things that are not bread, ‘bread’.

Banana bread is cake. Sweetbreads are most certainly doing the poorest job of living up to the constituent parts of their name since 10,000 Maniacs. And here we are: short bread. A biscuit, not bread.

Perhaps they are the person who also named red onions red, when they are clearly purple, yet no-one forms an orderly picket outside the supermarket to protest. Once again, I feel like David Vincent in The Invaders - living in a world being colonised by aliens - who knows the truth and can’t understand why everyone carries on as normal.

This is my default shortbread recipe - it’s shorter than Danny De Vito’s miniskirt - so expect the dough to pretend it doesn’t want to come together, but have faith.

It is promiscuously adaptable to many spices: caraway, anise, even celery seed (you heard me).

In my book SPICE/a cook’s companion, I use wattleseed and I’d really recommend you try it. It is the seed of edible species of acacia that flourish in Australia, where it has a long tradition of use by the indigenous people. The seeds are roasted and ground into a deliciously nutty, chocolatey, raisiny, coffee-ish powder that works so well here, in cheesecake bases, meringues, soda bread and so much more. You can buy it here.

Today’s version is lavender and fennel. Balance is everything here: too much lavender and it’ll taste like you’ve been on the fabric softener, too little fennel and you’ll be chasing that ghost of sweet aniseed.

If you are using your own lavender, the plump buds - when they are thinking of bursting into flower - are perfect, but really don’t fuss it too much: you can buy the flowers online too. And if you are in a hurry, try using finely chopped rosemary instead.

Whatever you do, take these out of the oven the instant the biscuits at the edge turn the faintest pale tobacco: all delicacy is lost with too much time in the oven.

100g sugar 

200g unsalted butter, softened

300g plain flour

pinch of salt

1½ tsp fennel seed

½ tsp lavender buds, roughly chopped

Preheat the oven to 160°C.

Cream the butter with the sugar. Sift in the flour, salt, and wattleseed and combine. Roll out to around 5-7mm thick and use a small cookie cutter to create circles of shortbread. Place the shortbread circles on a baking sheet and cook until just thinking about turning lightly brown - around 15-20 minutes. Sprinkle with a little more sugar and allow to cool for 10 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack, where they will firm up as they cool.

The ones I made today are little tasters for a thing, perhaps 2cm x 3cm and 5mm thick when cut: the mix made around 50. They are likely to hold hands some degree as they cook; run a sharp knife through to separate any a couple of minutes after they start to cool.