Salted Caramel and Peanut Millionaires Shortbread

I love millionaires shortbread but find it too sweet. This is a great way of making it less sickly. However, it does mean that you can eat more of it and are entering dangerous territory if trying to embark on a diet! I used salted peanuts in this recipe instead of salting the caramel to add constrast so that there's parts that are really salty and parts that are really sweet from the caramel. I like it that way but by all means just salt the caramel and leave out the nuts.

Ingredients

75g caster sugar

115g butter

200g plain flour (or 175g plus 1tbsp corn flour)

1 pinch salt

Caramel:

100g butter

100g light muscavado sugar

1 tin consensed milk 

150g dark chocolate

Method

1. Mix the butter and caster sugar until combined and resembling breadcrumbs. 

2. Add in the flour and press into a 20cm tin.

3. Bake at 150 degrees Celsius for about 30 minutes until golden. 

4. For the caramel, melt the butter and muscavado sugar together over a low heat. 

5. When combined, add the condensed milk, bring to the boil and stir continuously until the caramel is thick and coats the back of the spoon. As a test, dip in a cold teaspoon and if the caramel firms up and sets very quickly, it's good to go.

6. Pour the caramel over the biscuit and allow to firm up and cool.

7. When cool, top with the melted dark chocolate and allow to set. 

Tips

Make the caramel really thick. Be patient with it as it'll get there, it may just take a while. You should be able to drag your spoon from one side of the pan to the other and the line you've just drawn on the bottom of the pan to be still visible. This'll allow for an easily sliced caramel rather than having it too gooey and messy when trying to divide it up.

Cut through the chocolate when it's slightly soft so just before it sets otherwise it'll crack and you won't get uniform little squares. If it's set hard, dip your knife in hot water and divide up the chocolate first before cutting all the way through the shortbread. 

Try adding nuts to the base if you don't want to add them to the caramel (use unsalted though) for extra crunch but keeping the smooth caramel.