Choc & nut caramel slice

Choc & nut caramel slice

A crunchy base, thick chocolate and sweet caramel; these gooey teatime treats bring back nostalgic memories for Jane Hornby

Difficulty and servings

Moderately easy

Cuts into 16 pieces

Preparation and cooking times

Preparation time

Prep 16 mins

Cook time

Cook 50 mins

Plus 30 minutes cooling and chilling

Method

  1. Heat oven to 160C/fan 140C/gas 3 and lightly butter a 20 x 23 cm shallow baking tin. Sift the flours together, then stir in the sugar, almonds and a pinch of salt. Rub in the butter and vanilla seeds to make fine crumbs, then tip into the tin and press down with the back of a spoon. Put in the freezer for 5 mins, then bake for 35-40 mins. Cool.
  2. For the caramel, put the sugar and 100ml water in a heavy-based pan, heat gently until the sugar dissolves, then turn up the heat until it turns dark amber. Stir in the cream in four additions until smooth and shiny - take care as it will bubble up. Stir in the butter and ½ tsp salt. Pour over the shortbread and cool. For the topping, melt the chocolate and butter over a pan of simmering water, then pour over the caramel and smooth out with the back of a spoon. Chill until firm, at least 30 mins. Cut into quarters, then 16 pieces. Will keep in the fridge for up to 3 days.
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Jane says...

It must be 20 years since we last made these together, but the memory of standing in the kitchen stirring caramel with mum is still as vivid as ever. She knows I can't resist fiddling with a recipe, so now these shortbread slices have grown up too, and are made with creamy salted caramel, toasted almonds and a layer of dark, bitter chocolate

Making them with kids?

If you're making the slice for kids, you can swap the dark chocolate for milk, leave the salt out of the caramel and the nuts out of the base.

Per serving

358 kcalories, protein 4g, carbohydrate 34g, fat 24 g, saturated fat 13g, fibre 2g, sugar 22g, salt 0.15 g

Recipe from Good Food magazine, March 2008.

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Latest comments and suggestions

Results 1-20

  • Binder photo Sarah

    04 March 2008

    Sarah rated and commented on this recipe

    4 stars

    I (stupidly) bought double instead of single cream and used cheapo butter for the caramel so it didn't set particularly well, but the slices tasted soo good and the kids loved them - will do the recipe again - and properly next time!

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  • Binder photo kirstyjolly

    11 March 2008

    kirstyjolly rated and commented on this recipe

    3 stars

    I have mixed feelings about this recipe! The base was lovely, really good texture - not too crumbly, not too hard, and had a really nice flavour. The dark chocolate topping was also good. Unfortunately, the caramel did not go at all to plan and did not set hard enough. I ended up binning the caramel and using another recipe that suggested using condensed milk, golden syrup and butter instead. So before going for this, I strongly recommend reading up on how to make caramel as I feel the instructions in this recipe are too vague.

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  • Binder photo mary

    23 March 2008

    mary commented on this recipe

    Must agree the caramel not too good

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  • Binder photo Frantic Flapjack

    25 March 2008

    Frantic Flapjack commented on this recipe

    The shortbread and the chocolate were fine but the caramel was too runny, although not unpleasantly so. Mine was much paler than the picture above. All in all, a bit too sweet for me but my son loved it.

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  • Binder photo Joy Rowell

    25 March 2008

    Joy Rowell rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    I loved it although it is rather sweet. As for the caramel I made one batch and thought it looked really too pale to set so having enough ingredients I made another batch of caramel and cooked it longer and reading the recipe again, it said the caramel would bubble up when the cream was added and mine didn't the first time, so on the second attempt I added a small amount first to see if it bubbled up which it did and was fine. Also now and again I took it off the heat as I felt I couldn't see if the colour had gone to amber when it was bubbling up.

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  • Binder photo Jo

    25 April 2008

    Jo rated and commented on this recipe

    1 stars

    I didn't like this recipe. The caramel was far too sweet & didn't set properly although i have to admit that maybe that was because I didn't boil the sugar & water for long enough as my caramel was much paler than the picture. Very disappointing.

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  • Binder photo sarah

    27 May 2008

    sarah rated and commented on this recipe

    2 stars

    I made this despite the bad reviews hoping that taking heed of peoples suggestions here would mean a better result. No such luck. Agreed that the chocolate and the shortbread worked fine and are tasty, the caramel however doesn't really qualify as caramel. More sticky sugar paste. I tried cooking longer as suggested but to no avail. Not awful, but a can of dulce de leche would have worked much better.

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  • Binder photo Mrs B

    07 June 2008

    Mrs B commented on this recipe

    I also made a batch of these despite poor reviews and was determined to get the caramel right. Unfortunately I had the opposite problem on my first attempt. I heated it for too long and the caramel was more like tablet and didn't pour very well at all. It tasted good though but still not what I envisaged. Having enough ingredients, I made a second batch but this time, I did the cold water test and waited for the sugar to reach the soft ball stage, about 30 minutes. This time, it poured beautifully and set within minutes. However, the colour was no where near the same as the one in the picture . In fact the caramel was lighter than the shortbread! I agree that the instructions on making the caramel needs to be a bit more specific particularly with the timing. Someone mentioned using Dulce de Leche. I tried this before but it was difficult to cut the slices cleanly and is very sticky and messy to eat.

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  • Binder photo sandy_baby

    24 June 2008

    sandy_baby commented on this recipe

    does anyone have a alternative recipe for the caramel?

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  • Binder photo spacemonkey

    12 July 2008

    spacemonkey commented on this recipe

    Perhaps some of you have spotted this but I thought it might be worth saying that there is a similar recipe in the october 2007 edition on P112. It is for chocolate and hazelnut caramel bars and is utterly fab! I was actually looking for somewhere on the website to rate it when I came across all the caramel capers here. In case you don't have the magazine in question you need 125g butter, 1x397g tin condensed milk, 2tbsp golden syrup and 75g caster sugar. Just melt the butter add the other ingredients on a low heat and stir continuously for 15 minutes or so. Job done! Good luck everyone!

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  • Binder photo Anwen

    28 July 2008

    Anwen commented on this recipe

    Can anyone help? Tried making millionaires shortbread, the base and chocolate topping was fine but the caramel did not set and I had to throw the whole lot in the bin. The recipe I followed for the caramel was 5 oz brown soft sugar, 5 oz butter and 397g tin of carnation condensed milk. Melted all the above ingreadients over a low heat, stirring continuously until bubbles appear then remove. The mixture was then poured over the biscuit base and put in the fridge to set but it never setted. Does anyone have a recipe for caramel that sets??

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  • Binder photo Ali

    18 October 2008

    Ali commented on this recipe

    Hi all, I have made a similar recipe to this and it is homemade, and it is a lovely toffee sauce and sets really well, however you do have to leave it for an hour. The ingredient are; 7oz condensed milk, 4oz lurpax butter unsalted, 2oz of Billington's muscovado sugar and 2oz golden syrap. Method: 1/ Melt the butter, sugar and syrap on low heat in a saucepan. Once it has melted add the condensed milk. 2/ Once the mixture has come together and starts to bubbly, time 7 minutes. However you can't leave it as it will stick. 3/ Put over your cooled shortbread, and the longer you leave it the better give a minimum of an hour. 4/ From this when the toffee has set, melt some chocolate and put it over it. Vola Enjoy. Any questions or queries, do not hesitate to email me. Alicia Xxx

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  • Binder photo yvonne

    29 July 2009

    yvonne rated and commented on this recipe

    1 stars

    agree with other comments tried this recipe twice and caramel just doesn't set!

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  • Binder photo evilbendyone

    24 August 2009

    evilbendyone rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    in Europe you can buy tins of nestle condensed milk that they have turned into caramel (like dulche de leche), I used that instead of the caramel recipe, was so quick and easy and tasted great, v rich though!

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  • Binder photo Family Meals

    12 November 2009

    Family Meals commented on this recipe

    My husband has made this three times and the caramel has worked each time. He's not an expert by anymeans and so must either be luck or this receipe is not as bad as other people make out...

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  • Binder photo Family Meals

    12 November 2009

    Family Meals rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Forgot to add rating... He won a Christmas bake-off at work with this receipe.

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  • Binder photo cakeanyone?

    17 May 2010

    cakeanyone? rated and commented on this recipe

    3 stars

    If you've got a very sweet tooth then these are for you! To make the caramel I put all 3 ingredients in a pan together, dissolved the sugar slowly over a low heat and then boiled hard til soft ball stage (only took about 5 mins - used a thermometer but also used the cold water method to doublecheck it would set). In the end I wasn't particularly happy with the shortbread - a bit too crumbly, but overall they tasted very good.

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  • Binder photo engy_bengy02

    04 November 2010

    engy_bengy02 commented on this recipe

    that caramel does not set whatever you do so its a 0 out of 10 from me!

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  • Binder photo Ray

    28 May 2011

    Ray rated and commented on this recipe

    4 stars

    Really delicious treat, we saw the comments about the caramel not being so good so we left it on heat a few minutes longer and it worked out fine. A definite try if you're feeling like a yummy snack, but does take a while.

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  • Binder photo Hanacotta

    05 August 2012

    Hanacotta rated this recipe

    4 stars

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Difficulty and servings

Moderately easy

Cuts into 16 pieces

Preparation and cooking times

Preparation time

Prep 16 mins

Cook time

Cook 50 mins

Plus 30 minutes cooling and chilling

Gooey teatime treat

Ingredients

  • 175g plain flour
  • 25g cornflour
  • 50g golden caster sugar
  • 85g blanched almonds , toasted then finely chopped
  • 140g unsalted butter , cold and cut into cubes
  • seeds from 1 vanilla pod

FOR THE CARAMEL

  • 225g golden caster sugar
  • 142ml single cream
  • 50g butter , cubed

FOR THE TOP

  • 200g bar dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids)
  • 85g butter
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Per serving

358 kcalories, protein 4g, carbohydrate 34g, fat 24 g, saturated fat 13g, fibre 2g, sugar 22g, salt 0.15 g

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