Napolitaines

Mauritian pastry consisting of 2 biscuits jammed together and covered with pink icing.
Napolitaines are hardly available anywhere else but in Mauritius. Learn to make it and you’ll make new friends

2 cups flour, sifted
1 cup margarine, room temperature
strawberry jam, stirred to loosen
2 cups icing sugar
2-3 tbsp hot water
few drops of red food colouring

1. Pre-heat oven to 350F (180C).
2. Rub the margarine into the flour, and knead into a soft dough (might be a little bit crumbly).
3. Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface, to less than 1cm thick.
4. Cut out circles 2 inches in diameter out of the dough.
5. Knead any left-over dough together, and roll out again. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until dough is used up.
6. Place circles on lightly greased baking sheets, and pop into the oven for about 8-9 minutes, or until a very slight change in colour is noted.
7. Place baked biscuits on a cooling rack.
8. Once cooled, pair up the biscuits. Spread jam on one, and sandwich with the other.
   Place the jammed biscuits on a rack over waxed paper, inches away from each other.
9. Melt the icing sugar with 2-3 tbsp hot water. Add sugar and/or water as required to obtain a flowing yet viscous consistency. Add 1-2 drops of colouring and stir to make very light pink icing.
10. Coat the biscuits by pouring the icing over. Any icing that drops onto the waxed paper can be re-used. Leave to set before serving.

~ originally i tried using Madeleine Philippe’s recipe. however, the amounts did not seem to work for me. i use a flour to margarine ratio of 2 to 1. you have to try for yourself and find out what works best for you. i noticed that the fat content and sodium content in the margarine made a lot of difference in the biscuit, in terms of greasiness and saltiness. it does help to stick to the same margarine once you found the one that gave the best results.

twist:
Cut out heart shapes instead of circles and delight that special person
Sometimes, use blue instead of red/pink colouring.
One big napolitaine makes a great birthday cake for the extreme vegetarian. My late grandma was a pure vegetarian (no eggs) and we often have a big napolitaine as her b’day cake

notes:
Use margarine with no more than 90mg sodium/serving so the biscuits are not overly salty. Try Saffola. And NEVER use water in preparing the biscuit dough!