Chewy almond and orange biscuits (based on a recipe on www.chelsea.co.nz)

Ingredients

100g ground almonds

50 g golden caster sugar

finely grated rind of one large orange 

3 egg whites

1 generous tblsp warmed honey

a few drops of orange flower water (if desired)

Method

Preheat oven to 160 degrees C/140 degrees C for a fan oven/Gas Mark 3

 Line 2-3 baking trays with baking parchment and dust with sifted icing sugar.

Whisk the egg whites to soft peaks.

Mix all the dry ingredients (including grated orange rind) and then gradually add to the whisked egg whites. Now add the warm homey to make a thick paste.

Sieve icing sugar on to the work top. Take a spoonful of the paste, roll into a ball  and roll this ball in the icing sugar until well coated. Press each ball onto the baking tray allowing plenty of room for spreading. Bake for about 15 minutes until just colouring. Remove trays from oven and transfer biscuits to a wire cooling rack with a spatula. Allow biscuits to cool. Store in an air tight container.

For church I try not to make the biscuits too big, so I made 30 biscuits, for which I used 3 trays and cooked in 2 batches. If you were happy to bake bigger biscuits, you could cook them in 1 batch.

These were light soft biscuits with just a bit of a chew – not enough to challenge those with insecure teeth. The citrus flavour was a welcome alternative to my usual addition of chocolate. 

(Recipe based on one found on www.chelsea.co.nz)