01/08/2024

Jam and Cream Biscuits

Name: Jam and Cream Biscuits
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 12 min
Total time: 42 min
Ingredients: 225 g self-raising flour ((plus extra for rolling out)); 1 pinch salt; 150 g cold butter ((diced)); 100 g caster sugar ((plus extra for sprinkling)); 1 small egg; 100 g soft butter; 175 g icing sugar (sifted); 1 tsp vanilla extract; firm strawberry or raspberry jam ((see Recipe Notes if your jam is soft set))

Jam and Cream Biscuits are a homemade version of the British favourite. Two buttery biscuits sandwiched together with vanilla buttercream and fruity jam, finished with a sprinkle of sugar. Simple but delicious biscuits and perfect with a cuppa – whether you’re a dunker or not!

Jump to Recipe

When I was a child there were always packets of biscuits in the house. Nothing fancy, just your everyday Rich Tea, Digestives, Ginger Nuts and the like for dunking into a mug of tea. But at Christmas there’d be a tin of posher ones. Pink wafers, crunch creams, thick shortbread covered in chocolate and wrapped in foil and, my favourite, Jam ‘n’ Creams. These are two plainish biscuits sandwiched together with buttercream. The top layer has a hole in the middle with sticky raspberry jam peeping out, sprinkled with sugar.

There’s still something about that combination I love. So, on the odd occasion I buy a packet of biscuits rather than making my own, it’s almost always Jam ‘n’ Creams made by the same company. But biscuits aren’t what they used to be. The current list of ingredients is almost incomprehensible. Understandably, such biscuits are now considered an ultra-processed food.

So I thought I’d make my own delicious Jam and Cream Biscuits with simple, everyday ingredients.

You’ll find full instructions in the recipe card at the end. But I recommend you read the whole blog post for extra tips and step-by-step images.

HOMEMADE JAM AND CREAM BISCUITS

One of my early blog recipes was for a basic biscuit dough you can flavour how you like. This allows you to make an infinite variety of tasty biscuits. With just self-raising flour, salt, butter, sugar, and beaten egg, I decided to use it for my Jam and Cream Biscuits too. Crisp, buttery and light, it was just right.

All you do is rub butter into the sifted flour and salt, stir in the sugar, then add enough of the beaten egg to make a firm dough. So it’s easier to handle, chill the dough in the fridge for 45 minutes or so before rolling out.

ROLLING & CUTTING OUT

Due to the relatively high butter content, I keep one half of the dough chilled in the fridge while I roll and cut the other. I roll the dough thinly: 2 – 3 mm. You could roll it a little thicker for a chunkier biscuit. Just be aware you may need to bake for longer.

My recipe makes approximately 24 sandwich biscuits if you use a 5-centimetre cutter. So, to make a top and a bottom for each one, you’ll need a total of 48 circles. I use a fluted cutter to replicate the wavy edges of the original biscuits.

You’ll need to cut a hole in the middle of half the biscuits. These will be the top layer where the jam peeps out. I don’t have a cutter small enough for this, so use a piping nozzle. Gather up all the little circles you cut from the middle, plus the rest of the dough scraps, and re-roll to make more biscuits.

CHILLING AGAIN

Jam and Cream Biscuits cook quickly, so I prefer to cut them all out before starting the baking. That way, I can keep a close eye on the batch in the oven rather than being distracted by rolling and cutting the next.

I recommend you keep the cut-out biscuits on their baking trays in the fridge until ready to bake. Chilling the biscuits before baking firms up the butter so they’re less likely to spread in the oven. This means those nice, fluted edges should stay intact.

If you want to replicate the curved lines radiating from the central hole of the original biscuits, then chilling should also help with that. To create the lines, I use the edge of a piping bag collar.

BAKING & COOLING

The biscuits should take 9 – 12 minutes to get cooked through and lightly golden. But ovens do vary so check before then. My old oven cooks quite unevenly (I really must get around to buying a new one) so I turn the trays around halfway through.

Don’t worry if the biscuits seem a little soft. They will firm up more as they cool. So they don’t break, I leave the cooked biscuits on the tray for a minute or two, before carefully transferring to a wire rack. They should be completely cold before you add the buttercream and jam filling.

FILLING JAM AND CREAM BISCUITS

For the vanilla buttercream, you beat together soft butter, sifted icing sugar, and vanilla extract. Amounts to generously fill all 24 sandwiched biscuits are given in the recipe card. Once made, chill the buttercream in the fridge to firm a little before using. If it’s gone too firm, briefly beat too soften again.

If you want to use a piping bag to neatly add the buttercream to the bottom layer you can. But I just spread it with a knife. Turn the biscuit over so the flat side that was on the baking tray is now uppermost. Pipe or spread on a good layer, then gently press on top a holey biscuit.

While the original biscuits contained raspberry jam (I see the modern, ultra-processed version has ‘raspberry flavoured apple jam’), I prefer strawberry. For the biscuits in this post, I used some of this year’s Homemade Strawberry Jam. Because it’s soft set, I reduced it a little by briefly bubbling in a small saucepan. Once cool again, the jam becomes thicker and so less likely to run off the biscuits.

Pipe or spoon a blob of jam into the hole then, to replicate the look of the original, sprinkle over a little caster sugar.

Tip: If you prefer that the jam doesn’t stand proud of the hole, then leave a space in the centre of the buttercream layer, fill it with a small amount of jam, then place the top biscuit on.

STORING & SERVING JAM & CREAM BISCUITS

Stored in an airtight container, I’ve found that Jam and Cream Biscuits stay nice and crisp for three days. But they’ll still taste good up to five days if you don’t mind the biscuits being softer. If you want to freeze the unbaked biscuits that should be fine. If cooking from frozen, just give them a little extra time in the oven.

I was so pleased with how these biscuits turned out. They have all the buttery flavour I remember plus that perfect filling combination of soft buttercream and fruity jam. Also, no ultra-processed ingredients and no nasty palm oil.

Although I’m not much of a tea drinker, when I have proper homemade biscuits like these, I do love something to dunk them in – I am British after all! Happily, I can tell you that homemade Jam and Cream Biscuits pass the dunk test perfectly without crumbling or disintegrating.

If you’ve made this recipe, I’d love to know what you thought. Please leave a comment and rating.