Magic Wand Biscuits

For my son’s 6th birthday last weekend we had a rather magical party. I’m going to write about the day in more detail, but for now I thought I’d share one of my favourite recipes from the day – magic wand biscuits. I’d never made these before, but I really liked the idea of a simple iced biscuit on a stick covered with pretty sprinkles! This gingerbread is based on my trusty recipe from the Bero book and makes about 20 magic wands.

Ingredients

300g self-raising flour

pinch of salt

2 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp mixed spice

100g caster sugar

50g magarine

3 tbsp golden syrup

4 tbsp milk

A packet of Royal icing sugar (you won’t need much)

a selection of sprinkles – I used some exciting American ones which were much more garish than English hundreds and thousands!

A star cutter

A packet of wooden lolly sticks

1. Heat oven to 160C/325F/Gas Mark 3. Grease or line three baking trays

2. Measure flour, salt, ginger and mixed spice into a bowl

3. Place sugar, margarine and syrup in a small pan and melt over a gentle heat. Once melted pour into dry ingredients and mix well. Add the milk and keep mixing until you have a firm dough, then knead gently with your hands.

4. On a floured surface roll out the dough to a thickness of about half a centimetre and cut out your stars. Be careful not to roll the dough too thinly as you will need to insert your lolly sticks – the thinner the dough the harder this will be.

5. Carefully insert a wooden lolly stick into each star and arrange on your baking trays.

6. Bake the stars, complete with the sticks, for between 10-15 minutes. If you prefer doughy, chewy gingerbread then you will want to look out for a golden brown colour. If you prefer your gingerbread dark and crunchy allow a little extra cooking time.

7. Leave biscuits to cool completely – your biscuits will be soft but will firm up as they cool down.

8. Mix a little royal icing with water to a thick consistency (go easy on the water, you won’t need much) and drizzle over your biscuits. Decorate with your chosen sprinkles and leave to harden for a few hours.