Who wants to be a millionaire?

This week I decided to try my hand at making millionaire’s shortbread. It was my first time making them even though I have made a similar version of a caramel square but with a brownie base and hazelnuts in the caramel. I used two different recipes to make these, I used a BBC Food recipe for the shortbread base and a Donal Skehan recipe for the caramel. So I preheated my oven to 180C and lined a 23cm square tin and off I went. 

I cut 6oz of cold butter into cubes and added 8oz of plain flour to that. I used my hands to crumble the mixture and then I added 75g of sugar to the mixture and stirred that in.

I tipped the shortbread mix into my tin and pressed it down with the back of a metal spoon. I popped it into the oven for about 10 minutes, until it was a lightly golden, this is where the Donal Skehan recipe came into play. After ten minutes take it out of the oven but leave the oven on.

I then got started on the calorific caramel filling, haha. I put 1 tin of Carnation condensed milk into the saucepan along with 200g of caster sugar, 200g of butter, 4 tbsp of golden syrup and 1/2 tsp of salt. I put it on a low to medium heat, when it began to melt I brought it to the boil and kept stirring it until it turned a lovely toffee colour. After tasting it I added another bit of salt into it. Normally when I make caramel I leave it at a medium heat and stir it so this was new for me. The next part of Donal Skehan’s recipe was quite unusual compared to the other recipes I read.

I poured the caramel over the shortbread, it photographed with a lovely marbling affect, completely unplanned of course. Then back in the oven it went again for another 7 minutes. I took it out and left it to cool completely, well I got a little impatient and might not have waited for it to completely cool exactly but that’s what you’re supposed to do.

Next I melted about 300g of milk chocolate, you can use dark here too if you prefer that, and spread it over the caramel mixture.

I had also melted 150g of white chocolate the lazy way, in the microwave and poured it into a sandwich bag. I snipped a teensy little hole at the bottom corner of the bag and drizzled a good few straightish lines across the milk chocolate. Then using a toothpick I dragged it up through the melted chocolate and then down to create a Napoleon/Chevron design.

I let it cool completely and then I cut 20 little slices with a good, sharp knife and left them over night in a cool room.

The Result

The next morning I noticed that the caramel had bulged out quite a bit but thankfully that was easily rectified but cleaning up the sides with a sharp knife and it also resulted in some delicious little nibbles too. The slices were yummy although I’d probably add just a little bit more salt next time as it didn’t quite satisfy my sweet and salty tastes.