The latest in my ‘recreate a classic’ series, which I work on occasionally.
Digestives. We all know the digestive in the UK. They come as plain or chocolate covered. No plate of biscuits, selection box or office meeting is complete without a few of these tasty but wholesome biccies, and they’re normally the first to be eaten. There is something about the combination of wholewheat, and that sweet/salty balance which gives such a great all round flavour. Digestives are big hitters in the biscuit world.
It’s extremely difficult to come across dairyfree digestives. Doves Farm make some but otherwise they’re normally a no go for us. And that is how these experiments come about. How did mine turn out? Pretty close I am happy to say. Dunk them if you are that way inclined (not me thanks!).
Dairy-free Digestive Biscuits
(dairy-free, egg-free, nut-free, sesame-free, can be soya-free, vegetarian and vegan)
makes about 14
225g wholemeal flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
100g icing sugar
120g dairy-free margarine
30ml dairy-free milk
50g dairy-free chocolate (for chocolate coated biscuits)
- Preheat the oven to 170 degrees Centigrade
- Combine the flour, baking powder, salt and icing sugar in a bowl.
- Rub in the dairy-free margarine until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs
- Stir in the milk and bring together to form a soft dough
- Using plenty of flour, roll out and stamp out circles.
- Place onto greaseproof paper and prick with a fork or skewer
- Bake for 18-20 minutes, until golden.
- Cool on a wire rack
- For chocolate coated biscuits, melt the chocolate and spread over one side of the cooled biscuits, making an attractive pattern on top.
2 Responses
Dear Lucy,
Thank you so much for this site. I have made the digestives twice. I love digestive biscuits, and couldn’t eat them since I gave up eating butter and milk. I have a question though. I followed your recipe weights etc, but both times the dough came out too crumbly to roll and cut out the rounds. So I chilled the dough after shaping into a cylinder, and then cut rounds and baked them. What was I doing wrong? I used Earth Balance margarine.
Also baked the chocolate sable cookies yesterday. BIG hit with my boys, who had scoffed at vegan cookies before I began baking. All twelve cookies got eaten the same day.
Best,
Shobhana
Hi Shobhana, so sorry not to have replied sooner. I only just noticed a batch of comments I need to reply to! Yes it is a crumbly mix and your work around sounds perfect. We don’t get earth balance in the U.K. so maybe it has less moisture than the brands we have? I’m so pleased they got scoffed quickly 😊 x