Lemon Finger biscuits

So, final recipe to take into work for my birthday. I hadn’t made these before but wanted to make something else for work that was a bit different to the Sticky Ginger Cake and Honey and Lemon cupcakes. I had a look through my recipe file and found these lemon finger biscuits - they looked fairly quick and straight-forward so I decided to give them a go.

The original recipe (think I found it on an online forum) suggested it made 16 halves – I found it made more like 30! The biscuits are similar to shortbread in texture and are lovely with the sharp lemon buttercream in the middle, possibly slightly dry without. I was a bit worried that they would get soft overnight – as they absorbed the buttercream, but they actually stayed nice and crisp for about 4 days. They were simple and fairly quick to make and bake: I’d definitely do these again.  

Lemon Finger biscuits

Ingredients  

1. 225g butter at room temp
2. 55g icing sugar
3. 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
4. grated zest of 3 lemons
5. 225g plain flour
6. 3 tbsp cornflour

Filling

1. 55g unsalted butter at room temp
2. 125g icing sugar
3. zest of  1 or 2 lemons
4. Juice of 1/2 a lemon

Method

1. Preheat oven to 170C and line 2 baking trays with baking parchment.
2. Beat the butter and icing sugar together with the vanilla and lemon zest until fluffy.
3. Sift flour and cornflour together and stir into the creamed mixture.
4. Place mixture into a piping bag with a 1/2 inch fluted nozzle.
5. Pipe fingers (about 3.5 inches / 9cm long) of the mixture onto the baking trays, leaving 1 inch between each finger. (If you have too much mixture, leave in the bowl and do another tray once the first have baked). 
6. Bake for 12 mins until lightly golden brown.
7. Remove from oven and then leave to firm on the baking tray before transfering to a wire rack to cool.
8. To make the filling, beat the ingredients together until fluffy.
9. Once the biscuits are cool, spread or pipe the filling onto half the biscuits and sandwich together with the other halves.