Stamped Cookies #38 - Custard Cream Biscuits

Stamped Cookies #38: Custard Cream Biscuits - made dough March 28, 2024, posted by Shane Wingerd from Molded Cookies of the World Facebook group

For the biscuits 

3 tablespoons whole milk

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

½ teaspoon bakers ammonia 

225g (7.9oz) unsalted butter, softened 

115g (4oz) caster sugar or baker’s sugar (you want the smaller crystals) 

1/2 teaspoon salt 

340g (12oz) all-purpose flour 

125g (4.4oz) Bird’s Custard Powder

For the filling 

300g (10.5oz) confectioners’ sugar 

150g (5.25oz) unsalted butter, softened 

4 teaspoons Bird’s Custard Powder 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract 

1. In a small cup or bowl, combine the milk, vanilla extract, and Baker’s Ammonia, then set aside to allow it to dissolve. 
2. Place the butter, salt and sugar into the bowl of your mixer and beat until fluffy. 
3. Meanwhile, whisk the flour and Bird’s Custard Powder together in a small bowl. 
4. When the butter is fluffy, begin drizzling the milk/vanilla mixture into the mixing bowl while the paddle continues to run on medium speed. It may look a little strange at first, but keep beating it and it will all come together into a beautiful homogenous mass. 
5. Add the flour/custard powder mixture and beat together until you have a ball of smooth dough. (It takes a bit of time, but it will come together – if it doesn’t, add an additional teaspoon of milk). 
6. Shape the dough into a long oblong shape about ½ inch in depth. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill for at least 20 mins to firm up the dough. 
7. Once firm, roll the dough out, on a lightly floured surface, to a thickness of 5mm. Use a springerle mold, cookie stamp or embossed rolling pin with a shallow pattern. If you use deep pattern molds, the cookies will not bake all the way through before the edges begin to over-brown. 
8. Place the resulting cookies on parchment lined baking sheets; you can place them fairly close together as they will not spread.
9. Chill the baking sheets for 20 more minutes or at least as long as it takes to preheat your oven to 325 degrees F conventional or 300 degrees F for convection. 
10. Remove baking sheets from refrigerator and bake for 8-10 mins, or until the edges begin to turn a pale golden-brown color. Let the cookies sit on the baking sheet for about 3 minutes before moving them to a wire rack with an offset spatula to cool and crisp up. 
11. For the filling, cream together the confectioners’ sugar, butter, custard powder and vanilla extract in a mixer until smooth and light. 
12. Spoon a teaspoon of the filling onto one of the biscuits and evenly spread to the edges using a small offset spatula or place the filling in a pastry bag and pipe the filling onto the biscuit. Top with another biscuit. Repeat until all the biscuits and filling has been used up. The biscuits will keep in an airtight container for up to 1 week. 

I got this recipe from a Facebook group that specializes in stamped cookies. Members post recipes in the files and, due to the nature of the group, the recipes are the ones that would be good using with cookie stamps to keep the impressions.

I had seen other people post their pictures using this recipe and their stamped impressions always held beautifully so I knew I had to try it. Side note: since this is a British recipe, remember the Brits call cookies "biscuits", hence the recipe name. But they really are cookies and not the American version of "biscuits".

It took awhile for me to finally get all the ingredients together, namely the baker's ammonia, the custard powder and the superfine sugar. Yes, I could probably have used baking soda and regular granulated sugar but since I went to the trouble of sourcing Bird's custard powder (amazon), I figure I might as well stay true to the recipe and get the other ingredients as well to make as accurate a rendition of the recipe as possible.

As you can see from the stamped impressions after baking, the effort was worth the trouble. These turned out beautifully. My only mistake was chilling the dough a trifle too long as then the stamps didn't make as sharp an impression without me pressing down much harder than normal. Some I had to redo as I wasn't satisfied with the impression not being clear enough.

Still, this recipe worked well and tasted pretty good. It's not quite a straightforward vanilla or vanilla custard flavor but it's similar. The texture, if not baked for too long, isn't quite crisp but isn't quite soft either. It's somewhere in between. I preferred baking it an extra couple of minutes to get the crisp without the cookies turning too hard.

The filling was good too and paired well with the cookie. I'd definitely make this again. Except now I need more Bird's custard powder.