Mint Oreo Tiffin

I’ve been AWOL from my blog (and all the fun things in my life) due to studying and generally being dull and miserable.

Luckily, I have a brief 6 week reprieve now, so I’m busting back into my kitchen! Don’t call it a comeback.

During my study sessions, I needed to keep well fed, with plenty of flavoured coffee and sugar. Which is how I came across the concept of tiffin. It’s basically minty Rocky Road with a delicious creamy oreo filling. And it’s incredible. Mint and chocolate is the best combination and nothing will ever convince me otherwise. I didn’t add mint to the chocolate part because I wanted that to stand on its own, and I wanted the minty filling to be a good contrast. However, the addition of a few scattered mint chocolate chips was actual genius, if I do say so myself. Every couple of bites you get a extra mint explosion and it’s really stellar.

Now, normally I wouldn’t advocate using such a “rare” ingredient as mint oreos, since you couldn’t get them in UK shops. BUT about three weeks ago they launched them here. Which is both exciting and awful. Exciting because they’re my favourite thing ever and I can eat a whole packet in a day. Awful because they’re my favourite thing ever and I will eat a whole packet in a day. So I was good. I I didn’t buy a random packet to munch on, but I devised a recipe to allow me to buy and use 2/3 of a packet.

Oh, but what happened to the other 1/3? Don’t worry about it.

Anyway. This is the favourite thing I’ve made recently and you should all make it if you want to enrich your lives.

Ingredients for the tiffin

• 150g softened butter
• 375 g chocolate. I like to use 1/3 milk choc, 2/3 dark
• 4 tbsp golden syrup
• 250 g rich tea biscuits
• 5 mint oreos, plus more (halved) for topping
• 50g mint choc chips (I just cut up a bar of mint Green and Blacks)

Ingredients for the minty layer

• 60g butter
• 40g shortening
• 1 tsp peppermint extract
• A few drops of food colouring
• 200g icing sugar

Method

Begin by making the bottom layer. Melt the butter, chocolate, golden syrup and chocolate together and set aside.

Bash the digestives and oreos until you have a mixture of fine crumbs and a few larger pieces for some crunch, and tip over the chocolate chips.

Place the bashed biscuits into a large bowl, pour over ½ of the melted chocolate mixture and stir well to combine. Tip it all into a deep tray and press flat with the back of a spoon, ensuring you get it right to the corners.

Bung that in the fridge while you make the rest.

For the minty bit, just combine the butter and shortening and beat well until smooth. Add in the food colouring and flavouring and stir again. Gradually sift in the icing sugar until you get a smooth, spreadable consistency that isn’t too soft.

Spread that over the top of the chocolate-biscuit mixture and place in the fridge for about 20 minutes.

Cut a few mint oreos in half.

Remove the tray from the fridge, pour over the reserved melted chocolate mixture and carefully spread it to the edges. 

Place the oreo halves around the traybake, pressing carefully into the chocolate mixture. If you have any chocolate left you could drizzle it on top of the oreos to really cement them in there.

Refrigerate for a few hours until firm, or overnight. Before slicing, let sit at room temperature for about 30 minutes so that the topping won’t crack when you cut into it.

CHOW DOWN. I’ve never enjoyed a sugar rush so much.