Conas atá tú Bold Bakers, with Saint Patrick’s Day fast approaching I thought I’d share
a recipe with you that’s really popular in Ireland called Millionaire’s Squares
or.
caramel shortbread squares.
I had really fond memories of this growing up in Ireland they’re filled with shortbread,
then caramel, then a layer of milk chocolate they’re really delicious.
Also I want you to stay tuned until the end of this video because I’ve got loads more
authentic Irish videos to share with you so you’re not gonna want to miss that.
So of course the main ingredient in our Irish shortbread is butter, now we have a saying
in Ireland, what butter and whiskey won’t cure, there’s no cure for and I’m a big
believer in that.
You want your butter to be nice and soft because we’re going to whip it up.
Add that into your bowl, and next we’re going to add in a little bit of sugar.
And now here’s what I’m gonna do, I’m gonna cream these two ingredients together
using my electric hand mixer, you can also do this by hand with some elbow grease but
just make sure your butter is at room temperature.
So cream these two ingredients together until they get kind of a light color and kind of
fluffy.
Just takes a few minutes on high speed, and there you go.
This is what we’re going for.
And into this we’re gonna add in some flour.
Shortbread is really easy to make, you just need a few ingredients and it’s really delicious.
Little bit of salt.
And then we’re gonna go back in with our mixer and mix until our dough starts to come
together.
Doesn’t take long at all.
Okey dokey that’s it, our dough is coming together it’s starting to crumble.
Now we’re gonna get it into our prepared pan.
So here I have my 9x9 baking pan you can also use an 8x8 that would work really well too.
Now what we’re gonna do is add our shortbread base into the pan.
As you can see I’m ten months pregnant and I want a big caramel square and that’s what
I’m gonna make.
With your hands, and you can also do this with a spatula, but I like doing it with my
hands so I can know the thickness, but just pat your shortbread into the base.
Make it nice and compact and as level as you can.
There you go, gorgeous, gosh it smells so buttery.
Irish people do love their butter that’s true.
Ok gorgeous, so this guy’s ready for the oven.
You want to bake him off at 350°F / 180°C for roughly 30 minutes until it gets a light
golden brown.
So here’s our shortbread layer right from the oven, as you can see it’s a light golden
brown, this is exactly what we’re going for.
What you want to do now is set this to the side, let it cool down while we make our caramel
filling.
So first off, let’s talk caramel.
Now I don’t want you to freak out this is the simplest caramel to make, it only requires
2 ingredients… some condensed milk and butter that’s it.
Then all we need is some time, patience, then we’ll have lovely caramel to go on top of
our shortbread.
So I’m just going to open my tins of condensed milk and pour them into my heavy bottom sauce
pan.
So you might be wondering, “can I use my homemade condensed milk for this” and you
can, however I prefer the ones in tins to give you a consistent end result.
There we go, then we add in a little bit of butter.
Ok here’s the important part, turn the heat onto a medium low heat.
And then with a whisk, I use a whisk instead of a spatula I find that it keeps it all together.
Stir it every couple seconds because what can happen if you stir it away it’ll scorch
the bottom of the pan and you’ll get brown bits in your caramel.
So this is a low and slow process, it’s gonna take around 15 minutes but trust me
it is well worth it.
Stay close by, give it a stir, keep an eye on it, don’t let it get too brown and then
eventually you’ll see it turn a lovely golden brown color and that’s when we’re going
to take it off and it’ll thicken a lot.
So stay with me and I’ll show you exactly what you want to know.
So we’re around three quarters of the way there with our caramel and I just wanted to
show you how important it was, you notice that it gets considerably thicker.
And it’s a lovely kind of amber golden color, this is what we’re going for.
Just in case you do get any of those brown bits that are scorched from the pan, don’t
worry about it it won’t taste bad or anything, and once the caramel is done you won’t even
notice them.
I think I might have gotten a few in there.
So it’s been around 20 minutes or so, at any point if you want to turn down the heat
and go a little bit lower you totally can but what I want you to get is this look, this
amber, this golden kind of a brown amber color, this thickness once you get that, turn off
your heat you are done.
So very carefully pour all of your caramel on top of your shortbread.
Look at that, and then with a spatula, spread it out as evenly as you can, all the way into
the corners.
As you can see it’s already starting to cool down it’s starting to set up.
Just imagine when it goes completely cool it’ll be the perfect texture.
I remember when my mom used to make these when we were kids, this is no joke, she used
to close all the doors.
Nobody was allowed in the kitchen, nobody was allowed to open the door of the kitchen
so when we were young we thought caramel making was really hard and only an adult can do it,
and no one was allowed in there.
Thinking back on it now it was pretty funny, because she would make these every so often,
but it was a big deal, when she was making the caramel, no kids were allowed in the kitchen.
There we go it’s looking good, what I like to do when it’s nice and even is give it
some taps on the counter, and this just kind of helps it set a little bit and find it’s
place.
Gorgeous, two layers done we’ve only got one left to go, what I like to do now is set
this out at room temperature for around 2-3 hours or so, let it cool down then we can
get our chocolate on there.
So I’ve given it some time and it’s cooled down, so now let's get our chocolate layer
ready.
Here I have some milk chocolate, I like to use milk chocolate for this recipe because,
number one it’s what I grew up on, but it’s sweet it’s a little less bitter more kid
friendly.
This is around 55% cocoa solids you do not want to melt like Cadbury bars of chocolate
you want to use a cooking chocolate.
What I’m gonna do is pop this into the microwave and let it melt for around a minute or so.
So my chocolate is melted, so I’m gonna pour it all over my caramel.
So I did say they’re called millionaire’s squares most commonly in America and that’s
because of all the decadent layers, the shortbread, the caramel, the chocolate, that you almost
feel like a Millionaire when you eat them, so I think that’s a pretty good name.
In Ireland we call them caramel squares, same in England, same in Australia.
OK lovely, so what I like to do is give this a bit of a tap, on the counter, give it a
shake and let all that caramel just kind of find it’s home then you’ll end up with
a nice even layer of chocolate.
Nice, so we are almost there, we just want to let the chocolate cool down, let the chocolate
completely set, and then we can cut them.
So it’s been a few hours and my chocolate has set, check out these bad boys.
This must weigh like 5 pounds.
And it smells amazing, oh yum, butter caramel yummy yummy yumminess.
Let me just pull down the paper so we can see what all of the layers are like, oh my
gosh these are absolutely millionaire’s squares.
So now all we have to do is cut them, so you might want to use a warm knife, but just cut
your squares as big, or as small, or as big as you’d like.
My baby loves caramel squares so I’m gonna make big ones.
So check that out, shortbread, caramel, chocolate, three beautiful layers all ready to be eaten.
That’s just how I remember them.
So we have this lovely shortbread on the bottom and the caramel in the middle is almost like
a mix of caramel and fudge, it has such nice bite to it.
And then of course just a layer of chocolate on top I mean who’s gonna argue with you
about that.
Without a doubt, absolute heaven in a square.
—— I hope you enjoyed this taste of Ireland don’t go anywhere because I have loads more
Irish videos for you to watch, and one in my native language of — so definitely check
those out.
I’ll see you back here really soon for more Bigger Bolder Baking.