Caramel week was always going to be a good one, and we couldn’t turn down an opportunity to make a millionaire’s shortbread!
First and foremost, may we just say that Liam was ROBBED of the star baker title! He’s really upped his game and that peanut butter signature was something of pure joy, a little like our very own peanut butter millionaires shortbread in fact. It’s no secret that we’re a fan of the millionaire’s shortbread, the tray bake has appeared in several different incarnations on this blog! We originally wanted to give the technical challenge of Stroop Waffles a go, but we unfortunately don’t own a waffle cone maker (…yet!)
So millionaire’s it was, and after scouring our endless list of millionaire’s ideas we settled on maple bacon. A choice some might find a little odd, but we used the saltiness of the bacon to create our salted caramel flavour, with a little smokiness in there too, and in our opinion they turned out pretty great. The bacon flavour is subtle and the maple in there too results in a delicious caramel.
To really get the flavours coming through, we included a little maple syrup in our shortbread, as well as in the caramel. Then the bacon, we used some really nice honey cured, smoked, streaky bacon. Cooked it until it was really crispy and then chopped it up into really small pieces which we folded through the caramel once it was made.
- For the shortbread base
- 300g plain flour
- 100g icing sugar
- 200g butter
- 2 tbsp maple syrup
- 1 tin condensed milk
- 200g caster sugar
- 250g butter
- 3 tbsp maple syrup
- 200g streaky bacon, cooked till crispy and crumbled
- 200g chocolate (we used half and half milk and dark)
- 30g butter
- For the shortbread base
- Place all the shortbread ingredients in a large bowl and rub the butter in with your fingers, until it starts to come together into a dough.
- Before it fully comes together, tip the mixture into a lined 9×9″ tin, and press down until compact and in an even layer over the bottom of the tin.
- Prick the surface with a fork and bake at 150 degrees celsius for 25-30 mins.
- For the caramel
- On a low heat put sugar, butter and maple syrup into a heavy based saucepan
- Allow to boil and turn into caramel, then add the condensed milk.
- Your caramel will become a nice golden brown colour this may take a while, but you want the colour of your caramel to be a really deep brown, this way you will ensure your caramel is going to set well like toffee, the caramel will bubble and reduce and start to look thicker.
- Once the caramel is made, stir through the bacon pieces and pour on top of the shortbread, set aside and allow to set.
- Melt the chocolate and butter together and pour on top the set caramel.
- Spread evenly, shaking the tin gently from side to side helps to get a smooth surface.
- Allow to set in the fridge for a couple of hours.
- Remove from the tin and cut into roughly 1 inch squares.
