Saffron Biscuits

The second thing I made for the first Advent Sunday is again from a very old recipe in my collection and looked quite nice in the photo.

Ingredients
Makes around 55
2 dl granulated sugar
1 pinch saffron
150 g unsalted butter at room temperature
1 large egg
2 tsp orange zest
2 tsp baking powder
4½ dl plain flour
whole almonds for decoration

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 200 °C or 180 °C fan and line two baking trays with baking paper.
2. Place 1 tbsp of sugar and the saffron in a pestle and mortar and grind together.
3. Mix the remaining sugar and the butter to a creamy consistency.
4. Whisk in the egg, saffron and zest.
5. In a separate bowl, mix together the baking powder and flour, then add to the cake mixture. The dough will be too dense for a whisk, so use your hands to incorporate everything.
6. Divide the dough into four pieces and form each into a sausage. Place two pieces on a baking tray, then flatten a little and decorate with almonds.
   
7. Bake the trays for 15 minutes, then remove from the oven and slice at an angle with a sharp knife.
8. Move to a wire rack and let cool completely.

These biscuits did not turn out like in the photo and I know the recipe was wrong as it listed finely chopped almonds at the top of the ingredients list, but then never mentioned when they were to be used. I'd hoped to use some of my ground almonds, but I didn't dare add them at a random place in the baking process and instead just stuck whole almonds on top. In the photo they looked like a saffron/orange version of my fudge biscuits, but that's not what the result was. Still, they were tasty, but I'll try to adjust the fudge biscuit recipe next time. I also need to actually measure the orange zest next time, I sort of guessed at 2 tsp and I think I added more than that.

The biscuits were nicer when still a bit warm actually and I'll try to warm them up in the microwave when I have some next. I suspect they'd be good for dunking in your tea/coffee, if that's what you like, they seem to be pretty solid.

Update 15th December 2014:
I had a good read-through of the recipe leaflet. Indeed there are issues - the almonds as mentioned above for sure. But also I noticed that the photos and the recipes order were "quirky". I was looking at the wrong photo, so no wonder my biscuits didn't look anything like the ones on it. In fact, once I found the actual photo, I established that mine looked prettier, which was very pleasing. What Lundulph and I also discovered is that once you start nibbling on them, it's really difficult to stop...