I wear my heart on my sleeve
After reading Jen’s post about making chocolate-filled sable biscuits, I decided to give them a try myself as I’m also quite a fan of Shannon Bennett’s book “My Vue”. Similar to a shortbread biscuit, these sable biscuits have an almost ’sandy’ texture upon the first bite, but very quickly dissolve into nothing but a sweet memory and leave you craving more. Below is the recipe with slight modifications, as I found the original didn’t quite work for me.
Sable biscuits ingredients
500g plain flour
50g cornstarch
400g butter, diced and at room temperature
250g icing sugar
4 egg yolks from small-medium eggs
pinch of salt
1. Preheat oven to 160 degrees C.
2. Sift flour and cornstarch, into a mixing bowl. Make a well in the centre of the flour mixture, then add butter and sugar and work till butter is completely mixed in.
3. Add egg yolks and salt, drawing it into the flour and work till barely combined (do NOT overwork the dough as it will make the cookie tough and doughy).
4. Roll the pastry into a log and wrap in clingwrap and refrigerate for 90 minutes - 2 hours.
5. Remove dough 1/4 at a time and briefly knead, then lay down on a lightly floured surface and roll out to approximately 3-4mm thickness. Cut out with a cookie cutter and place on a lined baking sheet spaced about 1cm apart as they may spread slightly.
6. Place each tray of biscuits into the refrigerator for about 10 minutes before baking as this helps create a crisper biscuit and helps prevent spreading during baking. Bake these for about 10 minutes, or till they just begin to gain a golden blush along the edges.
These biscuits are so delicate that this one cracked whilst I was gently pressing the two hearts together around the chocolate ganache.
You can see from this close-up that the crumb is delicate yet dense, this biscuit disintegrates in your mouth with barely any chewing.
The recipe for the ganache is super-easy, equal parts dark couverture chocolate and thin cream melted bain-marie style (in a bowl above a pot of simmering water, the bottom of the bowl must not be in contact with the water) till the chocolate has melted. Remove from the heat source and continue to mix till the chocolate has completely melted and mixed into the cream. Leave it to cool whilst giving it the occasional stir.
Yummo - look at that sweet smoothness!
Personally, I found that I preferred the cookies without the ganache as it was a bit sweet for me, but they’re perfect with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream 
Dessert for the dinner party - apple pie with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream and heart shaped sable biscuit
*Edit: Just got back from seeing my friend Marie-Laure, a lovely lass who hails from France, and upon tasting one of these she exclaimed that they reminded her of her mother as her mother also makes these. So there you go - tasty AND authentic
Technorati Tags: sable, ganache, biscuit, cookies, shortbread
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Comments
Ellie Hi Rachel - these definetely are very pretty cookies - give them a try, they require a bit of time and effort, but the payoff is so, so worthwhile 
Lisa I don’t like shortbread. Or so I thought. But I have been craving it for weeks now and I’m not sure why. The crumb and description of these make my craving 200% worse.. in a good way, of course =) Thanks for sharing, sweetie.. you can bet I’ll be trying these!!
Ellie Lisa - I’m a bit so-so with shortbread as I think they’re a bit dry for my liking, but though these are similar, the texture and taste is a bit more moist! Warning - the recipe will yield about 50-60 cookies, so you’re going to be completely sabled up
Tanna - Thanks I usually can’t be bothered with the food posing, but I figured I’d give it a shot!
Ellie Ullo wibbles - and we’ll see, they use a heckuva lotta baking ingredients - that’s half a kilo of flour there matey!
Ellie Jen - It was pretty darn spesh apple pie and ice cream are a perfect combination anyway, and the sable provided a lovely contrasting texture to the plate! Thanks for posting about them - else I may not have tried them for myself!
Yum! Those cookies are so pretty! I love chocolate!