Viennese whirls don’t come from Austria but from England. However the texture was inspired by the Spritzgebäck biscuit, also in a whirl shape and with a similar dry crumbly almost shortbread texture.
My friend Jim who is visiting bought some Viennese whirls which frankly weren’t very nice. I decided to try my hand at making them, using a BBC food recipe. I often find if I recreate something from scratch, I start to like it. These were gorgeous and everybody liked them. Definitely a recipe on rotation now.
I added a little milk however as they are hard to pipe otherwise. Mine look very home-made, none of them are the same size, or have the same piped whirl. I like that. They each have a little personality.
I don’t understand why on the Great British Bake-off the judges are obsessed with uniformity. We are home bakers!
Viennese Whirl biscuit recipe
Serves 12
Ingredients
For the biscuits
- 200 g salted butter, softened
- 50 g icing sugar
- 2 tsp vanilla paste or scraped out pod
- 200 g plain flour
- 2 tsp cornflour
- ½ tsp baking powder
- 1 tbsp whole milk
For the filling
- 100 g butter, softened
- 170 g icing sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla paste or a scraped out pod
- 50 g jam
Instructions
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Heat oven to 180C and line 2 baking sheets with baking parchment.
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Put the butter and icing sugar in a large bowl/stand mixer and beat until pale and fluffy. Add the vanilla.
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Sift in the flour, cornflour, baking powder and milk. Fold into the butter/ sugar mixture until combined (the dough should have a thick, stiff consistency but not so stiff you cannot pipe it).
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Spoon the dough into a piping bag fitted with a large star-shaped nozzle.
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Pipe swirly circles 5cm diameter onto 2 baking sheets. Make sure there are spaces between each swirl as they will expand when baking.
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Bake for 10-12 mins, turning the trays around halfway through the cooking time so the biscuits are evenly baked, until pale gold. Leave to cool on the baking sheets for a few mins, then transfer to wire racks.
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While the biscuits cool, make the filling. Put the softened butter in a large mixing bowl and add the icing sugar and vanilla. Beat until fluffy and smooth. Transfer the buttercream to a piping bag and snip off the end.
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Arrange the biscuits into pairs, turning them over so the flat side is facing up. Spread half of them with jam. I used home-made plum jam that I had left over in a jar.
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Pipe the buttercream on the other half.Pair up the biscuits, putting them together until you have a jam half and a buttercream half sandwiched together. Serve with a lovely cup of tea or coffee.
