If millionaire’s shortbread is a bit like a posh Twix bar, the mint chocolate shortbread, which we invented last week by putting together two thirds of the millionaire’s shortbread recipe and a layer of peppermint fondant, is a bit like a posh Viscount or Yoyo biscuit. Americans will have no idea what those are, but British children of the 70’s know them well as the special treats everyone tried to grab first at the birthday party, well ahead of the chocolate digestives and the cheese-and-pineapple-on-cocktail-sticks, and as long as possible before desperation pointed out the egg-and-cress sandwiches. The Viscount is featured on this old “biscuit of the week” post on Nice Cup of Tea and a Sit Down, which notes absolutely correctly as follows; The skilled Viscount eater will flatten out the foil and use it to make a small model or trinket. (What that says about us Brits, I do not like to think.)

Anyway, the Full English mint chocolate shortbread is a somewhat fancier affair, including home-made peppermint fondant in the middle and good dark chocolate on top. You could definitely serve this as an after-dinner dessert, or even as an after-dinner mint- we found a real Brit to test it last week, and he compared it immediately to After Eights. Although, you have to be careful about comparisons these days, in case someone tries to sue you for knitting a dalek. Obviously there is no real resemblance between our mint shortbread and Viscount brand biscuits, as theirs are factory-made packaged biscuits and ours are home-made from proper ingredients. So we won’t be getting our lawyers onto them.