Fruit Shortcake

Ridiculously easy to make teatime treat...

Traditionally this little gem should feature strawberries, but I was gifted some homegrown peaches and raspberries and this seemed the perfect way to use them. The recipe is a dream to make, with no unusual or hard to find ingredients, so it would be perfect to whip up at short notice. I've added the orange zest just to give an interesting twist.

A little bit of trivia - the earliest recorded recipe for shortcake is in an English cookbook dating back to 1588!!

Ingredients

3 cups self raising flour
1/3 cup caster sugar
1 tsp baking powder
Grated zest of an orange
3/4 cup butter
1 cup soy milk 
2 tsps. apple cider vinegar

Method

Preheat your oven to 200C and line a baking sheet with baking paper.

Mix together the milk and apple cider vinegar and leave to one side.

In a large bowl mix the flour, sugar, baking powder and orange zest together. Then rub in the butter until it resembles course breadcrumbs, Try to be as light handed as possible. (Alternatively, use a food processor to pulse the butter into the dry ingredients).

Pour the milk mix into the flour mix and bring together using a wooden spoon until its just combined. It's very important to not overwork the dough, which will be quite wet and sticky. Place the dough onto your baking sheet and, using floured hands, shape roughly into a 20cm x 20cm square. Using a sharp knife, mark out 9 squares to make it easy to portion once baked. 

Brush with milk, sprinkle with sugar and place it into the oven for approximately 20 minutes until golden on top. 


Allow to cool and then split and fill with your chosen cream substitute and whatever fruit you fancy. I used whipped coconut cream mixed with icing sugar and vanilla extract. ​