Oat Wheat Biscuit

Oat Wheat Biscuit

Baking is definitely not my strength. It is probably because it is not a very common cooking method in Tamil Nadu. We did not have an oven at home either. When I relocated I was all excited about having an oven (yeah, am so silly) and couldn’t wait to bake. My mother-in-law taught me a basic biscuit recipe but also said it is not very good for health because of the quantity of butter and sugar. She is a nutritionist and so I would not argue. Needless to say, it tasted delicious. Then came a time when my son could start eating biscuits and I also read a research paper written by an Indian team saying children who snack on healthy biscuit develop and grow better than those that do not have biscuits. Isn’t that enough trigger for the dutiful mother? Off I went to the shop and looked at different biscuits in the baby aisle, picked the one with least chemicals and artificial whatever. My son liked it. But they still contain soda bicarbonate and some ammonium compound. Soda bicarbonate tends to reduce nutritional value. For this reason and for the simple reason that I would like to know whatever goes into his food, I decided to make a biscuit. That is how I put this recipe together and guess what? I no longer want to call it just baby biscuit cos I love it. It is such an ideal tea time snack. Crispy to wake you up, wee bit of butter to melt in your mouth and just dash of sugar to boost your energy.

½ cup allpurpose flour/maida

½ cup whole wheat flour (I used medium chapatti flour so it is rich in fibre as well)

½ cup oat flour (grind about a cup oats coarsely)

3 tablespoon sugar

50g butter kept in room temperature

1 teaspoon spice (cinnamon/nutmeg/ginger powder/cardamom powder or a combination) I used cardamom powder

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 pinch of salt

Mix all flour, sugar, salt, baking powder and spice

Add the butter and mix with hand to make crumbles that look like bread crumbs

Add very little water (just sprinkle) to form tight dough. Rest the dough for about 5 to 10 minutes. This will make the dough loosen a bit so make sure you do not add too much water thinking something is wrong.

Divide dough into four parts. Roll each one out to less than half millimetre thick and cut into desired shape using cookie cutter. You could do this with your kid so they get involved in the preparation which is said to encourage eating.

Bake in a preheated oven at 170degC for 20-25 minutes. Place a baking sheet over the tray, no need to grease. Keep biscuits spaced from each other as they will expand. The colour does not change much and just the edges begin to brown a bit.

Cool and dive!!