Mend a broken heart (or fill an empty stomach) with Charlotte Ree’s Nanny’s jam drops
When a divorce turned Charlotte Ree’s life upside down, she turned to cooking as a way to cure her loneliness. Immersing herself in cooking – everything from boiled eggs to lasagne – helped Charlotte rediscover herself and, in turn, laid the groundwork for her new book, Heartbake: A Bittersweet Memoir. This unconventional cookbook documents the dates (both disastrous and delightful) and moments where good food (shared with strangers and significant others alike) helped Charlotte get back on track. These Nanny’s jam drops – a cherished childhood recipe and one of Charlotte’s earliest food memories – are ideal for soothing an aching heart, wooing a potential love interest or offering to your close friends and family as a token of how much they mean to you.
INGREDIENTS
250 g unsalted butter, softened
165 g caster sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 free-range eggs
250 g self-raising flour, plus extra for rolling
1 jar fruit jam (raspberry, or your choice)
TO MAKE
Preheat the oven to 175°C and line a baking tray with baking paper.
Cover your hands in more flour and roll the dough into small balls, about 30 g each.
Place them on the baking tray leaving a 5 cm gap between each.
Flatten the balls slightly and press your thumb into the middle of each biscuit to make an indent.
Fill the hole with your jam of choice. I always choose raspberry but you could use fig, blueberry, strawberry or anything that tickles your fancy.
Bake for 20 minutes or until golden.
This is an edited extract from Heartbake: A Bittersweet Memoir by Charlotte Ree, out now through Allen & Unwin. You can read our recent interview with Charlotte in The Locals.
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