Fat Olives' chef says family inspired him to cook

I'm often asked when I started cooking and why.

I was brought up in a large family where we all enjoyed food cooked by our parents and were encouraged to cook ourselves.

Sunday mornings you could smell the bread being baked and Sunday lunch was a big affair where we sat round the table talking about the past week. My brother and I would cook a curry soup once in a while which got hotter every time.

If you want to encourage your children to cook, this is a great recipe.

Ingredients 

170g plain flour 

55g ground almonds

130g butter

55g caster sugar

1 egg

50g flaked almonds (toasted)

100g white chocolate

Method

1. Sift the flour into a bowl and cube the butter into it.

2. Rub the butter into the flour until it resembles breadcrumbs and then mix in the ground almonds and the sugar.

3. Whisk the egg and add it to the bowl.

4. Mix together to form a dough.

5. Roll out the dough on a flour dusted worktop 5mm thick.

6 Cut the biscuits out using a round cutter and place on to a baking tray lined with parchment paper.

7. Put in the fridge for 15 minutes before baking in a pre-heated oven 180c gas 4 for 12 to 15 mins. When you take them from the oven dust with a little caster sugar.

8. Allow the biscuits to cool, melt the chocolate and put into a piping bag.

9. Pipe a circle in the middle of each biscuit and top with the toasted almond flakes. Drizzle the remaining chocolate over the biscuits.