Chocolate & Cranberry Biscuits

Wow, don't you just love this sunny weather? Finally, we can throw open the windows, hang out the washing and just generally get out of the house without needing to put twenty layers on first.

Anyway, here's a great recipe for anyone who still has a post-Easter chocolate surplus and wants to find an excuse to siphon some off and put it to better use. The original recipe calls for dark chocolate but it doesn't matter in the slightest - you can use whatever you have to hand.

This is a great recipe from the beautiful Apples for Jam by Tessa Kiros. The biscuits are packed full of chocolate and cranberries and so you end up with little hilly, knobbly biscuits rather than the neat flat ones. Trust me, this is no bad thing.

Chocolate & Cranberry Biscuits

(adapted from Apples for Jam by Tessa Kiros)

75g/2 3/4 oz butter, softened

50g/1 3/4 oz soft brown sugar

50g/1 3/4 oz caster sugar

1 egg

a few drops of vanilla essence

160g/5 3/4 oz plain flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

110g/3 3/4 oz chocolate, roughly chopped

50g/1 3/4 oz dried cranberries

1) Preheat the oven to 190c/375f/gas mark 5

2) Cream the butter and sugar together in a large bowl then beat in the egg and vanilla.

3) Beat in the flour, baking powder and a pinch of salt until you have a sandy mixture, then stir in the chocolate and cranberries.

4) Spoon teaspoonfuls of mixture on to two lined baking sheets (the original recipe suggests you use your hands to roll the mix into neat balls which you then flatten slightly. I suggest that this is far too much trouble to go to and just plopping the mixture directly on to the baking sheet with a spoon means that you'll get your mitts on the finished article in much less time).

5) Bake for 12-15 minutes until the biscuits are just starting to brown round the edges. Leave to cool for a few minutes before transferring to a wire cooling rack.

Makes about 30