Buttery Orange Biscuits

British-style buttery orange biscuits, sometimes called melting moments back in the UK and Ireland. The trick ingredient is custard powder, specifically Bird’s Custard Powder if you can find it. The cornstarch in the powder makes the cookies sandy and crumbly, the vanilla and color give them a buttery yellow hue, and the small amount of flour next to the cornstarch keeps them tender to the bite.

The orange rind has to be fresh. Bottled or dried zest tastes flat against the rich butter base. Pull the zest with a microplane, taking only the orange skin and stopping before the bitter white pith underneath.

Creaming the butter, sugar, and zest together until light and fluffy is the key technical move. The whipped fat is what gives these biscuits their melt-in-the-mouth texture instead of dense cookie chew.

Pro Tips

• Use butter at proper room temperature, soft enough to dent but not greasy
• Cream a full 3 to 4 minutes for the lightest, most tender biscuits
• Don’t overmix once the flour and custard powder go in. Overworked dough makes tough cookies
• Let the biscuits cool fully on a rack. Warm biscuits are fragile and crumble easily

Variations

• Swap orange for lemon zest and a teaspoon of lemon juice for a sharper citrus version
• Sandwich two biscuits with vanilla buttercream and a smear of orange marmalade for the classic melting moment
• Dip half of each cooled biscuit in melted dark chocolate for a more grown-up cookie