Council of Elrond - Sam's Recipe Box

Description: A delicious chocolaty treat for young Elves with an imaginative mind and a craving for adventure.

Submitted by: Johnele on 2003-08-15 03:27:03

Serves: 24 chocolate boats

Prep Time: 1 hour

Difficulty: Intermediate

Ingredients

225g/8 oz. plain flour
150g/5 oz. butter or magarine
50g/2 oz. ground almonds
100g/4 oz. caster sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten --
--Decoration--
350g/12 o.z chocolate flavoured cake covering
1 packet each liquorice allsorts,
smarties, jelly tots, Skittles
24 cocktail sticks and paper for sails

Instructions

Lightly grease 24 10 cm/4-in boat-shaped pastry moulds.

Sift flour into a bowl. Rub in butter until mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Stir in almonds, sugar and egg; mix together quickly to make a firm dough.

Knead dough lightly, wrap in cling film and chill 30 minutes, or longer if you have time.

Set oven to 190C, 375F.

Roll dough out on a lightly floured board to a thickness of 5mm. Using a rolling pin, lift dough into base and sides of each tin.Trim away excess pastry by rolling the rolling pin over top of the moulds.

Prick base of each boat all over with fork and line each one with aluminium foil, shiny side upwards.

Place the moulds on two baking trays and bake in oven 20 minutes. Remove foil and bake 10 minutes longer, or until lightly browned.

Allow biscuits to cool in tin for a few minutes before transferring the to wire rack to cool.

Meanwhile, break chocolate cake covering into pieces and place in a bowl over a saucepan of hot water. Heat gently, stirring occasionally, until melted. Dip each boat in chocolate cake covering and drain off any excess, then place the boats on non-stick baking paper.

When half-set, decorate each boat with liquorice allsorts. Fix the sail on and fill boat with sweets. Let set completely before serving