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Given the widespread popularity of digestive biscuits, it is understandable that many individuals question where they can purchase digestive biscuits. I'm here to tell you how to put them together yourself. They have a satisfying, grainy texture due to the use of wholemeal flour and medium, slightly coarse oatmeal.
In the United States, graham crackers and digestive biscuits are used interchangeably. You could think of these as a whole wheat version of shortbread; they're just as buttery and have the same satisfying crunch. In Ireland, biscuits are cookies, not the soft variety found in the United States. In contrast to the semi-sweet, crisp, and crunchy biscuits, the soft and chewy cookies may be found in the cookie world.
The word "digestive" has been used since the 19th century and refers to something that makes digestion easier. In the year 1839, two Scottish physicians came up with the idea for digestive biscuits. Because sodium bicarbonate is an ingredient in digestive biscuits, people used to believe they possessed the same fundamental qualities and health advantages as an antacid. This is because the digestive biscuit recipe calls for sodium bicarbonate.
Let's follow Jamie Oliver's instructions and make some digestive biscuits.
Ingredients:
75g cold butter
100g wholemeal plain flour
65g fine or medium oatmeal
¼ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
35g soft brown sugar
1 to 2 tablespoons of milk (dairy, almond or soya all work well)
Optional: melted chocolate or royal icing to dip
Optional toppings could include: finely chopped nuts, or other types of seeds, dried fruit, coloured sugar, almond flakes and alike.
Method:
Mix the butter, flour and oats with your fingers in a big bowl until the mixture looks like bread crumbs. Mix the sugar and baking soda together until the sugar is dissolved. To this, add 1 tablespoon of milk, and use your hands to work the ingredients into a dough. You may need to add a bit more milk so that it all comes together into a single mass; the dough should be cohesive without being too sticky to handle. Make a thick piece of dough by pressing and squeezing it, and put it between two sheets of cling film. Use a rolling pin to roll it out to about 2 cm thick, and put it in the fridge for at least 30 minutes. When the dough has cooled, roll it out onto a surface that has been dusted with flour to a thickness of about one centimetre. If you are a beginner, you may try rolling out only a portion of the dough at a time and storing the remaining dough in the refrigerator. This will make the dough easier to work with.
Cut as many circles as you can from the dough using a cookie cutter with a straight edge or the rim of a small cup or glass (being careful), then place the rounds onto a baking tray that has been lined with parchment paper. If you choose, you can emboss some of the tops of the biscuits; try to come up with a few different shapes if you can. While you preheat the oven to 170 degrees Celsius/ 325 degrees Fahrenheit, place the baking tray in the refrigerator to cool for twenty minutes. Bake for ten to twelve minutes, or until the outer edges appear to turn a golden brown colour. After the biscuits have cooled, if you are feeling really artistic, you can decorate some of them by dipping them in melted chocolate or coloured icing and then sprinkling them with nuts and seeds to create a more elaborate pattern.
