It’s now Monday 21st February and I’m on half term week this week. I am glad of the break and the catch up. It made me think about what half term was like last year and we were still in the third lockdown. The weather was definitely wet after all the snow had melted up here in the Vale of York but now it’s windy! The sun is out after not seeing it for days on end. But I’m not looking forward to going out for a dog walk later in this.

I know Valentine’s Day was a week ago but last week I ran out of time to complete my blog posts. As I mentioned in my previous post, I’m struggling to fit everything in at the moment. I went down to London on Saturday to visit my daughter’s uni exhibition. I thought oh great, the train has Wifi so I’ll use it to type my blog on my iPad WordPress app. Well, I started the work, then the Wifi was so rubbish. It wouldn’t save my work. Then the train became really crowded, so I gave up and read a magazine instead!

Anyway, that’s enough of what’s going on today. I need to go back to last week and Valentine’s Day. What do you think of Valentine’s Day? I personally hate the commercialism behind it. I think if you love someone, you show it to them every day of the year. Not just on 14th February with an overpriced bunch of red roses. I know I might sound cynical, but Mr S and I just exchange cards and we make a nice meal now. Last year with Valentine’s Day on a Sunday, I made Mr S a special Afternoon Tea. It didn’t look that impressive compared to all the Valentine Afternoon Teas you see festooned with hearts and lots of pink and red. But you go with the personal touch- what that person likes. If I’d given Mr S a massive buttercream cupcake covered in fondant hearts, he would have just eaten the sponge.

I do sound like a hypocrite though, as that’s exactly what I made for other people to give to their loved ones this year. Because I don’t like doing Valentine’s Day presents, doesn’t mean my customers feel the same way! I made some boxes of Cupcakes in two different varieties, some Chocolate Brownie Cakes and some Jammy Dodgers. Now Mr S does love these and I saved him a few.

Jammie Biscuits or Jammy Dodgers are just so much fun to make and I don’t always make them exactly the same every time I bake them. Sometimes I make them heart shaped with a mini heart in the middle. Or other times it might be with a circular cutter. But, whatever the shape, they still taste the same. I did attempt to make my own version of them after they were featured in the last season of the Great British Bake Off. They looked nothing like Paul Hollywood’s version, though!

Here is my version: A Bake For All Seasons #2: Jammy Dodgers

I scratched off another square from the #100bakeschallenge poster from Crumbs By Collette. It was difficult to scratch off as the poster is on the back of my office door, which has panels on it.

JAMMY HEART BISCUITS

Makes 12 sandwich biscuits approx (24 biscuits needed)

You need a large and a small heart shaped cutter if you want to make heart shaped ones. I used the third largest for the actual cookie itself and the smallest one to cut out the centres.

I have this set from Hobbycraft:

https://www.hobbycraft.co.uk/wilton-heart-shaped-cookie-cutter-set-6-pieces/574473-1000

You will also need two baking trays lined with baking parchment.

INGREDIENTS:

200g softened unsalted butter

200g caster sugar

400g plain flour

1 large free range egg

Approx half a jar of seedless raspberry jam

Icing sugar to dust

• Pre-heat your oven to 160oC (fan)/ 180oc/350oF or Gas Mark 4.
• Prepare your baking trays and line them with baking parchment.
• Put your butter and sugar into a mixing bowl and cream them together. You can do this with a mixer or by hand. I do it in the mixer so I can be doing something else at the same time.
• Add an egg to the creamed butter and sugar and mix well.
• Finally, add in the plain flour.
• Mix until the mixture forms a dough.
• Roll into a disc and wrap in cling film. Chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.
• When the dough has chilled, dust your worktop and your rolling pin with extra plain flour. Roll out the dough to the thickness of a one pound coin. Make all the biscuits plain hearts.
• Re roll as the dough gets used up. Put the biscuits well spaced on the baking trays. You might need to do this in two batches. For half of the biscuits, stamp out the heart shape in the middle while the biscuit is on the tray. It’s easier to get the shape out on the tray and also doesn’t distort the biscuit shape as you move it from your worktop to the tray. The mini hearts can either be kept and baked separately, or they can be all rolled up to be turned into bigger biscuits!
• Bake for 10-12 minutes but please watch the oven as they can burn easily.
• Let the biscuits cool on the tray for 5-10 minutes before attempting to move to a wire rack to cool down completely.
• When completely cool, sandwich the biscuits together with seedless raspberry jam.
• If you want to, you can dust your finished biscuits with icing sugar.

These biscuits should keep for up to 5 days in an airtight container. I’ve never known them to last that long, though as they’ve usually been eaten by then!