Wagon Wheels Biscuits | Bake Off Technical Challenge

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Okay, so I might be a year late to the party with this one… But for this year´s biscuit week on the Great British Bake Off I decided to make last year´s technical challenge: Wagon Wheels.

Wagon Wheels are quite a famous biscuit here in the UK consisting of two vanilla biscuits that are sandwiched with jam and marshmallow, before the whole thing is coated in dark chocolate. With multiple (tricky) elements to master, i.e. making the perfect biscuit, making a jam and some marshmallow from scratch, Paul Hollywood certainly gave the baker´s a run for their money with this Wagon Wheels technical challenge! But you may know by now that I am up for a challenge, so I thought I´d give it a go.

I used the recipe given in the book from last year´s season (GBBO – Get Baking for Friends and Family), and can also be found on the GBBO website. The recipe below is based on this but gives you a recipe for homemade raspberry jam (which the book does not) and a few tips and tricks on what I would do differently from the recipe given.

The four components of Wagon Wheels Biscuits – Biscuit, Jam, Marshmallow and Chocolate

Wagon Wheels are made up of four main components – biscuits, raspberry jam, a fluffy marshmallow and a smooth coating of dark chocolate! Here are a few of my tips and tricks for making these four components:

BISCUITS

The biscuits in this recipe are really delicious! Not too sweet and the vanilla paste gives them a really rich vanilla flavour. Vanilla bean paste may be expensive, but it´s totally worth it! As you are wanting to create perfectly round biscuits that can be neatly sandwiched together, don´t forget to pop the biscuits into the freezer for a few minutes whilst preheating the oven! That will stop them from spreading!

RASPBERRY JAM

To make the jam, I use a really quick and easy method that just involves boiling some fresh or frozen raspberries with jam sugar for a couple of minutes. Make sure you use jam sugar instead of regular caster or granulated sugar, as the jam won´t thicken and/or set otherwise.
I you want to give yourself a little less work, however, you can of course use shop-bought jam in this recipe, too!

HOMEMADE MARSHMALLOW

The original recipe says to make the marshmallow whilst you are leaving the biscuit dough to rest in the fridge and leave it to set whilst you are doing everything else. I am so glad I didn´t stick to that because my marshmallow set faster than I could say Wagon Wheels! I left it for about 10 minutes and then luckily already checked to see how it was doing, otherwise I might have missed the stage at which it was pipeable completely! Anyway, in the recipe below I have said to make the marshmallow once the biscuits are ready…

The marshmallow isn´t too difficult to make, but it does require a little patience and “equipment”. You will need a sugar thermometer to heat the sugar syrup to 120°C (you want the mix to be hot in order to cook the egg white) and also require an electric mixer. Ideally, a free-standing mixer, because you need to whisk the sugar syrup and egg white for about 8 minutes and otherwise need to stand there and hold the mixer yourself the whole time! I survived though…

Once the marshmallow is thick and glossy, you´ll need to spoon it into a piping bag. You can either fit the piping bag with a round nozzle, or just snip off the end to create a round opening. When piping the marshmallow onto the biscuits, make sure to take the marshmallow almost completely to the edge of the biscuit. It will only spread slightly when sandwiched, and otherwise you will have a slight “indent” at the sides of the biscuits which will prevent you from evenly coating the Wagon Wheels with the melted chocolate.

The recipe below makes more marshmallow than you need, so you could use any leftovers to sandwich together other biscuits or in any other recipe you can think of.

CHOCOLATE COATING

The chocolate coating might seem like the easiest part to this recipe, but it´s actually very difficult to perfectly coat the Wagon Wheels with melted chocolate. First, the bottom of the biscuit is given a chocolate coating and left to dry. I´d recommend melting about two-thirds of the chocolate to give you enough to easily dunk the biscuits in and then just re-melt any leftovers with the remaining third of the chocolate when you need it later on. For more tips and tricks on working with and melting chocolate, check out my baking basics post on How to Master Chocolate.

Once the biscuits have been sandwiched with jam and marshmallow, you coat them completely in melted chocolate – and let me tell you – it´s not easy trying to create a thin and even layer of chocolate, as well as “filling all the cracks”!

Suggestions for Recipe Alterations

These Wagon Wheels are an absolute meal in themselves! They are HUGE! Haha, if I ever make them again, I will definitely use a smaller cutter (maybe 4-5 cm)! I think making smaller, but more biscuits would be a lot better, as this will make it a lot easier to just have one with a cup of tea in the afternoon… Using the 8cm cutter makes gigantic biscuits – so much so that you feel bad eating more than half at any one time!

With regards to the jam, although raspberry is arguably the best, you could also use a cherry jam or an apricot/orangey/marmalade type of jam to give your Wagon Wheels a chocolate-orange twist!

For the chocolate, I´d definitely recommend going with dark chocolate, as it cuts through the sweetness of the jam and marshmallow in between the biscuits. This results in an overall not too sweet or sickly biscuit. If you are after a sweeter biscuit though, or not a fan of dark chocolate, you could use milk chocolate (or a mix of both) a go!

Essential Equipment and Ingredients for this Recipe

I won´t lie, this recipe does require a few nifty pieces of baking equipment and also uses slightly more expensive and “unique” ingredients that you might not find amongst your usual baking cupboard essentials.

In terms of equipment, you will need an 8cm round biscuit cutter (or a smaller one, see recipe alterations above), a rolling pin, a sugar thermometer, an electric hand (or free-standing) whisk, a piping bag and two large baking trays lined with baking paper. I´d also recommend using a small off-set palette knife to coat the Wagon Wheels with chocolate at the end.

When it comes to the ingredients, first of all you will need some vanilla bean paste for the biscuits. Vanilla bean paste can be quite expensive, but it is really intense and gives your bakes an amazing flavour! This recipe also uses some good-quality vanilla extract (not essence, that is weaker and therefore cheaper) to flavour the marshmallow with. Generally speaking, good-quality vanilla extract and/or vanilla bean paste are used in most recipes and as you often only require a little, definitely worth the investment for the amazing flavour you get from it!
Furthermore, you will also need special jam sugar for the jam (otherwise it won´t set), and some liquid glucose and powdered gelatine for making the marshmallow. The gelatine will help set the marshmallow, and the liquid glucose makes sure that the marshmallow firms up, but doesn´t become rock-solid.

More Great British Bake Off Inspired Recipes

I have many a recipe on this blog that was inspired by the Great British Bake Off! You should definitely go check some of them out:

• Paul´s Mini Pineapple Upside Down Cakes with Vanilla Custard
• Mary Berry´s Strawberry Fraisier Cake
• Classic Victoria Sponge Cake
• Viennese Whirls | British Baking Classic
• Mary Berry´s Bakewell Tart with Feathered Icing
• Paul´s Mini Pork Pies
• Mini Chocolate and Raspberry Sandwich Cakes
• Paul Hollywood´s Hand-Raised Chicken, Bacon and Apricot Pie
• Mary Berry´s Frosted Walnut Layer Cake
• Chocolate and Nut Baked Alaska
• Paul Hollywood´s Mini Custard Tarts
• Swiss Roll Cake with Strawberries and Cream
• Mary Berry´s Viennese Whirls | British Baking Basic
• GBBO Signature Chocolate Cake | Bake Off Box #1
• Mini Walnut and Banana Loaf Cakes | Bake Off Box #2

Wagon Wheels | Great British Bake Off Technical Challenge

Recipe

Ingredients (makes 8 ):

FOR THE JAM:

• 100g fresh or frozen raspberries
• 25g jam sugar
• OR 5 tbsp of shop-bought raspberry jam

FOR THE BISCUITS:

• 200g plain flour
• 150g salted butter, cut into cubes
• Pinch of salt
• 75g caster sugar
• 1 tbsp vanilla bean paste
• 1 large egg yolk

FOR THE MARSHMALLOW:

• 1 large egg white
• 1 x 12g sachet powdered gelatine
• 200g caster sugar
• ½ tsp vanilla extract

TO FINISH:

• 250g dark chocolate, melted

Method:

1. If you are making your own jam, use a potato masher to crush the raspberries in a small saucepan. Add the jam sugar and heat gently until the sugar has dissolved. Turn up the heat and boil the jam for 5-8 minutes until thickened. Pour into a shallow container and leave to cool.
2. To make the biscuits, put the flour, salt and butter into a mixing bowl. Use your fingertips to rub the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Stir in the caster sugar followed by the vanilla bean paste. Finally, add in the egg yolk (reserve the white for the marshmallow) and bring the dough together into a ball. Flatten into a thick disk, wrap in clingfilm and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.
3. In the meantime, line two large baking trays with baking paper.
4. Remove the dough from the fridge and roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface until about 3mm thick. Use the round biscuit cutter to cut into round biscuits and place them on the lined baking trays, leaving a little space in between each biscuit. Re-roll the offcuts and cut out more circles until you have 16 biscuits.
5. Freeze the biscuits for 10 minutes to firm up whilst you preheat the oven to 180°C.
6. Bake the biscuits in the preheated oven for 10-12 minutes until they are a pale golden colour. Leave to cool on the trays for a few minutes, then carefully transfer the biscuits to a wire rack to cool completely.
7. To make the marshmallow, put 100ml of water into a small bowl and scatter over the gelatine to soften. In a small put, gently heat the caster sugar, liquid glucose and an additional 100ml of water until the sugar has dissolved. Bring the sugar syrup to a boil and heat until the syrup reaches 120°C on the sugar thermometer.
8. Whilst you are waiting for the sugar syrup, whisk the egg white in a medium-sized bowl (or that of a free-standing mixer) until stiff but not dry.
9. Once the sugar syrup has reached 120°C, remove from the heat and quickly stir in the gelatine mixture. Pour the sugar syrup in a steady stream into the bowl with the egg white whilst whisking constantly at high speed. Continue whisking for about 5-8 minutes until the marshmallow is thick and glossy. Spoon it into a piping bag (either fitted with a round nozzle or just with the end snipped off) and leave to cool for about 5-15 minutes until cool and of a good consistency for piping.
10. Pipe the marshmallow over half of the biscuit rounds, taking the mix almost completely out towards the edge of the biscuit.
11. Melt about two-thirds of the dark chocolate over a bain-marie (place the chocolate in a heat-proof bowl over a pot of simmering water, for more instructions check out this post here). Dip the 8 biscuits that don´t have marshmallow on them into the chocolate until the base and sides are fully coated. Set them, chocolate-side-up, onto a wire rack to set. Set any leftover chocolate aside for later.
12. Once ready to assemble, turn the coated biscuits chocolate-side-down and spread some raspberry jam over the top. Then set the marshmallow covered biscuits on top of the jam to sandwich the biscuits together.
13. Place the bowl with the remaining chocolate over the bain-marie again and add the final third of the chocolate to melt. Pour the melted chocolate over the biscuits to cover, using an off-set palette knife to spread the chocolate evenly over the top and make sure the sides are fully covered.
14. Leave the chocolate to set completely before serving.