Pecan, Hazelnuts and Sour Cherry Florentines

Pecan, Hazelnuts and Sour Cherry Florentines served on a wire rack
  • 16 servings
  • 50 minutes to prepare
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Ingredients

  • 150g Billington's dark muscovado sugar
  • 3 x 70g packs Forest Feast sour cherries
  • 100g unsalted butter, cut into cubes
  • 300g Green and Blacks dark chocolate
  • 100g pecans
  • 100g hazelnuts
  • 180g golden syrup
  • 100g Booths plain flour, sifted
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1 tsp ground ginger

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 180ºc/ gas 4

The nuts

1 Spread the pecans and hazelnuts out on a baking tray and roast in the oven for about 6-8 minutes, until they’re toasted and fragrant.

2 Blend half of them in a food processor until roughly chopped. Keep the other half whole and set aside.

The base

1 Heat the butter, sugar, spices and syrup in a saucepan and stir over a medium heat until all the ingredients have melted together.

2 Take the pan off the heat and stir in the flour.

3 Get two flat baking trays and line them with greaseproof baking paper.

4 Pour half the melted mixture into the middle of each tray, and using a palette knife, spread it out so it’s even to about 2mm thickness. Leave a thumb-width border around the edge because the mixture will spread in the oven.

5 Put both trays in the oven and cook for 5 minutes.

6 Take them out and scatter with the ground nuts and sour cherries, then put the trays back in the oven for 10-15 minutes, until the mixture is a deeper colour and bubbling.

7 Let the mixture cool, but for no longer than 5 minutes. Using a cookie cutter, and working in from the edge, cut rounds of Florentines.

8 Put them on a wire rack as you go. Work quickly because the mixture will cool and become brittle and difficult to cut. If that happens, put the tray back in the oven for a couple of minutes to soften up. Once you’ve cut them out, chill the Florentines in the fridge.

The Chocolate

1 Get a medium saucepan and glass bowl that will sit in the saucepan but not touch the bottom.

2 Add some water to the pan and bring to simmering point.

3 Break the dark chocolate into pieces, put them in the bowl over the saucepan of water and let it all melt slowly.

4 Remove the chocolate from the heat once melted and dip your Florentines into the chocolate so they’re half covered.

5 Rest the Florentines on a wire rack for 20 minutes, then put them in the fridge until the chocolate has set and gone from glossy to matt.

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