Chocolate Afghans

This recipe is based on the Edmonds afghans and is T-A-S-T-Y. Super easy to make, incredibly adaptable, mouth-wateringly delicious. Need I say more?

Ingredients

Biscuits

200g butter

½c sugar

1¼c flour

⅓c cocoa

1c cornflakes

25 cocolate melts (I use Nestle) – these are a secret ingredient

Icing

25g butter, melted

2 tbsp hot water

1c icing sugar (aka confectioner’s sugar)

¼c cocoa

25 walnuts

Method

1. Soften butter, then beat the butter and sugar until creamy. I usually beat for 1-2 minutes.

2. Add dry ingredients and mix until combined.

3. Lightly crush the cornflakes and add – I needed to do this with my hands as the mixture was too thick for the egg beater.

4. Roll into tablespoon sized balls and flatten slightly. Place a melt on top of each biscuit.

5. Cook at 180°C for 15 minutes, or until cooked, turning half way through. A good way to tell if they’re cooked is by trying to pick a biscuit up from the side – if it bends or cracks then it’s not cooked yet but if the biscuit lifts up from the tray cleanly then it’s done.

6. Allow to cool then ice and top with a walnut. Enjoy :)

Chocolate Icing

This recipe, as with many of the recipes I use, is very adaptable. You can make it sweeter, chocolatier, thinner or butterier – it’s up to you how you like it. I’ll give a general guide then you taste and adjust to what kind of icing you want. And it can be used for anything. I usually put it on all of my chocolate biscuits and cakes and I’m sure you can come up with some creative ideas too. If you’re not into such rich, thick icing, you can make it without the butter – my sister does this regularly and it makes for a glaze-like topping that is thin, runny, and much lighter. 

I tried to capture how runny this icing was – runny but still kinda thick. I wanted to be able to pour it over the biscuits but still have it thick-ish. I had to keep adding water throughout the icing process as it was cooling and thickening quite quickly. I often make icing in a paste-like texture for spreading over biscuits but for today’s afghans I wanted a sleek look.

Ingredients (again) *

25g butter, melted
2 tbsp hot water
1c icing sugar (aka confectioner’s sugar)
¼c cocoa

1. Melt butter, add hot water

2. Stir in icing sugar and cocoa

3. Adjust to taste: To make it runnier, add more water. To make it thicker, add more icing sugar. To make it chocolatier, add more cocoa. And to make it richer (this batch was a bit too watery for my taste), add more butter. Easy peasy.

4. Spread or pour onto biscuits

5. Top each biscuit with a walnut while the icing is still wet et voila!

* Disclaimer: I didn’t actually use these exact quantities when making today’s icing. I didn’t measure so these are guestimated. I’d say these quantities would make a medium thickness, reasonably rich, quite chocolatey icing. Let me know how it works out if you try it though.