I’ve been wanting do to a coffee & walnut something for a while now, but something that wasn’t just a cake. I had my eye on Nigella’s coffee & walnut cookies from How to be a Domestic Goddess (p62). However I also have a Swedish Walnut Crisp recipe I’ve been wanting to try, from All the Good Cookies (p157). So… adapting the Swedish crisp recipe with Nigella’s help I’m doing coffee & walnut Swedish crisp.

For the base:

• 225g butter
• 200g caster sugar
• 2 large egg yolks (US XL)
• 310g flour
• 3 tbsp instant espresso powder

Cream the butter and sugar, beat in the yolks one at a time. Mix the flour, salt & espresso powder in a bowl, then mix in.

This is then supposed to go in a 14 inch pizza pan. I decided to just roll out between parchment sheets, then put on a baking tray, and slightly crimping the edges.

Turns out this is only 12 x 11 inches. So… it’s a bit thicker, so I might add some extra cooking time to ensure it’s crisp.

I then popped this in the fridge while I made the topping.

For the topping:

• 100g light brown sugar
• 2 large egg whites (US XL)
• 1 1/4 cups chopped walnuts

Beat the eggs white to soft peaks. It says 3-4 minutes… After about 2 minutes I thought I was nearly there, then 30s later it seemed to have gone into just fluff :( It also said to just gentle stir in the sugar… but I decided to beat that in, a la meringue, and after that I was back to soft peaks: hurrah! Then I folded in the chopped walnuts (well bashed up in a bag with a rolling pin :) ).

This then got spread on the base, as near to the edges as I dared.

This then went into a pre-heated 160c fan oven for 30 minutes, turning half way through.

After 30 minutes (or thereabouts due to forgetting to set the timer after I rotated it!) it looked as the book said it should: edges browned, topping dry.  So I took it out of then oven and turned it off, cut into pieces as the book says to do with a pizza cutter.

Cutting through the walnut bits with a pizza cutter wasn’t easy! Maybe a sharp knife would have been better. Also it didn’t seem that crisp, especially in the middle, so I popped it back into the cooling oven for another 15 minutes.

So… the proof is in the pudding, as they say. I had to cut it again with a knife to the get pieces out, but they came out whole!

It tastes amazing! It’s crispy on top too, although a bit longer in the oven (or having it thinner) would probably be better, but all-in-all a big success!