To walnut or not to walnut

That is the question I asked myself when first perusing the ingredients for these biscuits. I'm not that happy when other things intrude into the flavour of chocolate too much so I was wondering how walnut pieces would be in this week's Double Chocolate Oriolos. Happily I read on to find that the walnuts are processed to a fine crumb.

At first I thought these were named as a derivation of Oreos (oriolos = little Oreos?) but it turns out Rose named them after someone (Mr Oriolos) who worked on one of her books. Perhaps it's not just coincidence though that these have something of what makes Oreos so attractive; that dense not-so-sweet chocolate taste (I tend not to eat the cream filling). These biscuits have a deliciously dark, dense chocolate sandiness. It reminds me a lot of my favourite brownie recipe from childhood. I loved that book...and the brownies (I never added the optional walnuts).

These biscuits are incredibly easy to make. First whiz toasted walnuts, sugar and cocoa in the food processor until it's like sand.

Add in cold butter and whiz again.

Disregard Rose's instructions and whiz way past the 'just incorporated stage' to something more like creamed.  It doesn't take long, believe me.

Yes, it is hard to tell the difference between the photos above and below. The one below is where I've pulsed in the flour. It's meant to be dry and crumbly.  Hmmm.  Have a look at Marie's post if you want to see a properly dry and crumbly mixture. 

Still, my dough was extremely delicious. This dough is vying with Rose's rugelach dough for top billing on tasty raw doughs. If you think I'm shameless for eating so much raw dough well, you'd be right, and you might be satisfied to know I felt quite ill after a bit too much *testing*.

The fun bit - rolling the dough into balls after an overnight rest in the fridge. Then tamping them down with a glass dipped in sugar. I used some demerera sugar I had in the fridge because I saw Kimberlie's biscuits before I made mine and thought the bigger sugar crystals looked pretty. It was fun because although the dough was a bit sticky the sugar coating meant it (mostly) didn't stick to the glass bottom.

You're meant to brush the sugar crystals off the baking tray with a little brush before baking but the chance of me doing anything so fiddly are zilch. And I didn't mind a few sugar crystals. I pondered blowing them off but decided that was unhygienic and greedy (since I'd be forced to eat them all myself). 

My biscuits took a long time to bake - about 40 minutes or more. And in the end I loved the inclusion of the ground walnuts. It just added to the delicious sandiness from the sugar and cocoa. A great little biscuit to eat with a strong cup of coffee and a glass of water.

Next week is the blue cheese cheesecakes I mistakenly thought we were making a few weeks ago. They sound a little bit odd...