Millionaire’s Shortbread

One of my cousins was visiting for Easter weekend and so I wanted to prepare a few goodies for when she and her boyfriend arrived.  I skimmed through the copy of Delicious magazine that EHH had bought me recently and came across Harlequin rugby player James Johnston’s recipe for millionaire’s shortbread. Mum used to make this for us when we were kids and it is one of EHH’s favourite treats but I’d never attempted it, so I decided to have a go.

The following is my adaptation of the recipe – as I felt that the instructions in Delicious were rather limited. It is really important to keep stirring the caramel while simmering – it didn’t say this in the magazine and my first attempt at the caramel failed dismally – burning at the bottom and turning into a very strange lumpy texture. Second attempt, I kept stirring throughout and it turned out fine – except I think I took it off the heat slightly early, as it didn’t quite taste cooked through and it was lacking a bit of flavour. So make sure that you wait until the caramel has turned a nice dark golden colour before taking it off the heat.

This recipe provides a very thick caramel layer – you could probably just use one tin of condensed milk (although EHH thinks it is perfect with this very thick layer of caramel!). Next time, I may also add in some sea salt flakes to give the caramel a bit of oomph. The shortbread layer itself is incredibly simple to make but has a fantastic flavour and texture. The original recipe had only a dark chocolate topping – I added the white chocolate swirls – mainly just to look pretty!

Update October 2013 - you may also want to try my Billionaire's shortbread with salted caramel. 

Millionaire’s shortbread

Ingredients

1. 175g butter, at room temperature
2. 75g caster sugar
3. 250g plain flour
4. 200g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
5. 50g white chocolate, broken into pieces

For the caramel

1. 100g butter
2. 50g light brown sugar
3. 50g golden syrup
4. 2 x 397g tins of condensed milk

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 170C and grease and line a deep 30cm x 20cm baking tin with baking parchment
2. Put the butter and sugar in a large bowl and cream with an electric mixer for about 5 minutes until light and fluffy.
3. Stir in flour until evenly mixed, forming a dough.
4. Press the dough into the prepared tin, then bake for 20-25 minutes, until golden.
5. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely in the tin.
6. In a heavy based, non-stick pan, melt the butter, light brown sugar, golden syrup and condensed milk over a low heat, stirring constantly.
7. Continuing to stir constantly, bring to a simmer and then bubble gently for about 20 minutes, until it turns a dark golden colour.
8. Pour the caramel evenly over the shortbread and leave to set.
9. Put the dark chocolate into a heatproof bowl and melt over a pan of just simmering water (don’t allow the water to touch the bowl). Set aside while you do the same with the white chocolate.
10. Pour the dark chocolate over the caramel and spread evenly.
11. Driizzle the white chocolate over the dark chocolate, and then use a knife to marble the two together.
12. Leave to cool completely and then cut the shortbread into squares.