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Gold Millionaire Shortbreads

Everyone's a winner with these easy millionaire shortbread gold medal biscuits. Butter fudge makes a great cheat's caramel.

By bbcfood · From Open Recipes · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and semolina match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 310 recipes mention both. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

The recipe

Makes 12
Prep2 hr
Cook1 hr

Ingredients

Contains: milk, wheat (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. Preheat the oven to 160°C (325°F). Line a 20 cm (8 in) square tin with baking paper.

  2. Rub the butter into the plain flour, caster sugar and semolina until it resembles fine crumbs, then press the mixture together into a smooth dough.

  3. Press the dough evenly into the tin, prick all over with a fork, and chill for 30 minutes.

  4. Bake the shortbread for 40 to 45 minutes until pale golden. Leave it in the tin to cool completely.

  5. Gently melt the butter fudge pieces in a small pan over low heat, stirring until smooth. Pour over the cooled shortbread and chill for 20 minutes to set.

  6. Melt the dark chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, stirring until smooth. Spread over the fudge layer.

  7. Chill for about 30 minutes until the chocolate is set. Dust lightly with gold luster dust if using, then cut into 12 pieces.

By bbcfood. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Flour + semolinatop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together310 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + chocolatetop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together15,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Flour + buttertop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together122,858 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + chocolatetop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together10,480 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 10% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together98,096 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Flour and butter share little aroma chemistry, yet 122,858 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs