Toasted cardamom shortbread

Preheat oven to 160C and grease and line a 30x18 cm tin with sides at least 3cm.

Combine the rice and plain flour, sugar, salt and butter in a food processor and blitz until just combined. Turn out onto a very lightly floured work surface and gently knead to bring together to a dough. Press evenly into the roasting tin, cover then place in the fridge to chill for 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, for the cardamom sugar; place the whole cardamom pods on a tray and pop in the oven for 10 minutes or until the green pods turn a light brown colour and are smelling lovely and aromatic.

Tip into your food processor and blitz until as fine a powder as possible, don’t worry if you have a few bigger woody bits, you can always sift or pick them out.

Mix the ground cardamom with the sugar and store in a jar or airtight container until needed.

Once the shortbread is nice and chilled, take out of the fridge and cut into fingers, bars or small squares. You could also use a cookie cutter here and punch out some fun shapes.

Place these on a couple of lined trays, prick the surface of each biscuit a few times with a fork then sprinkle generously with the cardamom sugar.

Bake for 15-20 minutes or until shortbreads are a light golden colour. Let cool on a wire rack then store in an airtight container.