It's World Baking Day today!
That's a whole entire day dedicated to cookies! crumbles! pies! shortbread! cheesecake!
It's also exactly 1 month and 1 day to Father's Day, so we thought we'd do something for World Baking Day and create a recipe that's a cool nod to dads everywhere.
Enter Shawn Taylor, Culinary Advisor (and Photographer!) at Purdys Chocolatier. As Culinary Advisor, Shawn has created or collaborated on hundreds of both savoury and sweet recipes for Purdys, either online at purdys.com or for our special eBook collections.
And as Photographer at Purdys, Shawn has also styled and shot every single one of your favourite chocolates. We know, we know, it's a sweet job and somebody's gotta do it.
Shawn (that's him in the photo with his son) is the father of two impossibly adorable children, and he took inspiration from them: "I’m really into baking and cooking, and I love showing my kids how you get to enjoy something you made yourself and how it’s easy to work with chocolate when you follow the steps."
Licorice Caramel Shortbread Squares
Ingredients:
- 2/3 cup + 1 tbps butter
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1 1/4 cup flour, sifted
- 10 Purdys Licorice Caramels
- 4 Purdys Vanilla Caramels
- 4 tbsp cream
- 100 g Purdys Classic Dark Chocolate
Instructions:
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- Prepare a 9 inch square pan with cooking oil or line with parchment paper.
- In a medium bowl, use a mixer to cream 2/3 cup butter and sugar together until fluffy.
- Sift flour and stir it into creamed butter until mixture is evenly crumbly. Be careful not to over mix or shortbread will become tough.
- Press into a 9 inch square pan and bake for 20 minutes. When finished, set aside to cool.
- Cut caramels into quarters and melt in saucepan with cream on medium heat, stirring occasionally until melted. Be careful not to burn the mixture as the chocolate will melt quickly but the caramel will need another 1-2 minutes to melt. Continue stirring until emulsified, for another 2-3 minutes.
- Spread caramel onto cooled shortbread and set aside to cool.
- Chop dark chocolate into small pieces and melt in heatproof bowl in microwave for 20 seconds at a time until melted. Stir in 1 tbsp butter until mixture is smooth and silky.
- With a spoon, drizzle the chocolate on top of the caramel layer and chill for 20 minutes in fridge or for 1 hour at room temperature.
- Cut into 2 inch squares to serve.
You can also grab the printable version of this recipe.
