Viennese Whirls are DEFINITELY my signature bake - I find them very therapeutic to make, I love how they look when finished, and they are by far the tastiest little biscuit in my opinion (I won't go into the biscuit/cake debate). When I bake them I always stick to the conventional flavour of the plain vanilla biscuits sandwiched together with vanilla buttercream, and seedless raspberry jam. But when perusing the jam and preserves section of the supermarket last week (everyone does that, right?) I found this little beauty staring back at me…
Duerr's Rhubarb & Custard Homebaking jam (purchased in Aldi)
I knew I had to use it in a recipe pronto, and having recently had a go at making my own custard creams, I decided to make a Rhubarb & Custard version of the Viennese Whirl.
RHUBARB AND CUSTARD VIENNESE WHIRLS
(makes 16 sandwiches)
*around 250 calories per sandwich*
Ingredients
For the biscuits
250g very soft butter
50g icing sugar
250g plain flour
50g Birds Custard powder or cornflour (whichever you have to hand or a 50/50 mix)
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract/ vanilla bean paste
For the filling:
100g soft butter
200g icing sugar
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste
1-2 tbsps whole milk to loosen
a small amount ofyellow gel food colouring, to make a lovely vibrant yellow.
85g Duerr's Rhubarb and Custard Jam
(You could also use fresh rhubarb stewed down to a pulp, cooled and then ripple it through the buttercream for alternative version!)
Method:
1) Preheat your oven to 190/Gas 5, and line a baking tray with reusable baking parchment, or greaseproof paper.
2) Weigh out all of your biscuit ingredients andcombine in a food mixer, or using an electric beater. You could also dothis by hand. Ensure your butter is very soft to make the biscuits easy to pipe.
3) Fit a large star nozzle (I use Wilton 1M) into your piping bag, and fill with your mixture. Pipe flat(ish) circles starting at the outside andworking into the middle - push downwith the nozzle in the centre to finish the flowery rosette. You're looking for your biscuits to be around 5/6cm across. You should be able to pipe around 32 single biscuits with this dough, more if you make them smaller.
4) Bake for around 13 minutes until lightly golden, and firm. Leave to cool on the tray for 5 minutes beforecarefully transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Fresh from the oven, cooling for 5 minutes until I transferred them to a wire rack
5) Now to make the filling: pop the soft butter into a bowl, sift over the icing sugar, vanilla and food colouring and then mix on a high speed until light andfluffy. You might need to add some milk to loosen and smooth out the mixture. It should be silky and soft, and easilypipe-able.
6) Once the biscuits are completely cool, ensure you have them sat in pairs of matching size, and turn over one of each pair. Pipe a generous rosette of the buttercream filling using the same star nozzle and piping bag (cleaned first) on to the turned over biscuit.
Buttercream on, just waiting for the jam before being sandwiched together.
7) Weigh out your jam, and stir it in a bowl to make it easier to spread. Turn over the second biscuit in the pair, and smoother on a layer of the rhubarb/custard jam. Then sandwich the two biscuits together, and repeat until all of your biscuits are sandwiched together.
8) Pop in the fridge to firm up for about 30 minutes, and then ENJOY!
T'ah D'ah!
Delicious!
Hubby and I devoured a couple of mini ones last nightin front of the semi-finals of The Great British Bake Off, purely for taste testing reasons you understand. I really enjoyed them, despite being a traditionalist, and LOVING theoriginalversion, it was fun to play around with a new flavour, and adapting the recipe was fun.
I sent a box of them off to hubby's office this morning (hope you enjoy them guys!), and the rest aredestined for today'splay-date with my lovely friend Jade from Late For Reality… can't wait to share them with her over a nice cuppa!
What spin would you give to Viennese Whirls, or are you a traditionalist at heart, like me?
Happy Baking!
Mrs B
xxx
Disclaimer: This post is my entry into The Great Denby Cake Off competition.
