Crumbly, spicy, chocolatey, gooey or crunchy, there's a cookie and biscuit for every taste. This collection of our best recipes covers every option, from retro bakes, classics with a new twist, speedy varieties, some which need more time, fun biscuits to decorate for every occasion and great ideas for baking with the kids. No matter what your favourites are, you'll find them here.
The fig jam offers a more adult flavour to these buttery, orange cookies. Feel free to replace it with strawberry, raspberry or blackcurrant for kid-appeal. The dough is mixed up in moments using an electric mixer. They take just 10 minutes or so to bake, and will keep for up to three days in an airtight container.
White chocolate and cranberries are such a great combination, the slight tartness of the cranberries contrasting with the sweetness of the chocolate. These are made with gluten-free flour and baking powder, which gives a softer texture to the baked cookie. For a slightly crisper bake, you can use normal flour.
Get the recipe for wheat-free cookies with white chocolate and cranberries here
Shop-bought shortbread can never touch homemade, and with the help of your food processor, it's so quick to make the dough. It's quite a stiff dough, but it's meant to be, so don't be tempted to add any water to it. Orange zest is added, which goes so well with the dark chocolate. You could dip them in white or milk chocolate if you prefer.
Everyone will love these gooey chocolate cookies. The recipe uses a bar of chopped up chocolate, so to make it easier, pop the bar in the freezer for 10 minutes. Otherwise, use milk chocolate chips for speed and uniform size, though you may miss those occasional lumps of melted chocolate! Cookies spread further than you may think, so space them well apart on your baking sheet.
These cute little biscuits are lovely with ice cream or just a coffee. Matcha powder (you only need a teaspoon of it) provides the vibrant colour, then crunch is added with cornflakes and chopped pistachios. White chocolate chips add extra sweetness. They freeze well and you can bake them from frozen.
These cookies are shorter in texture than a classic cookie, a little more like a biscuit. The trick is to chill the dough before cutting them, which helps keep their shape and stops them from spreading too much. A silicone mat or baking parchment will prevent sticking when baking any biscuit or cookie.
A hob nob is a very popular British biscuit which launched in the 1980s. It's oaty, buttery and sweet from golden syrup. With just seven store cupboard ingredients, homemade versions are easy and take this biscuit up a few notches. You could also try dipping half the baked biscuits into dark or milk chocolate. The perfect biscuit with a cup of tea.
Melt-in-the-mouth buttery little biscuits, infused with ground cardamom. They are crisp and crumbly, from a combination of three flours to give texture – plain, semolina and gram, or chickpea flour. Topped with chopped pistachios and almonds, they are easy to make and will keep in an airtight container for up to a week.
Here's a twist on a classic, buttery Scottish shortbread, with the addition of lemon zest and finely chopped pistachios. Use the juice of the lemons for another recipe, or freeze until needed. The trick is also to retain some texture in the nuts, so don't blitz them to a powder. This recipe makes around 18 biscuits, but they will keep for up to two days in an airtight container.
Get the recipe for pistachio and lemon shortbreads here
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Get your slow cooker to do the hard work to create this indulgent cookie-meets-dessert. Think of it as a rich butter cookie, sandwiched with a chocolate butterscotch sauce. Simple to make, perfect served warm with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream.
Use this recipe to make perfectly decorated butter cookies for any time of year. Just use different cookie cutters and colour the icing accordingly. If you've ever struggled to make the best royal icing for decorating, you'll have it nailed with this easy recipe.
These soft, buttery biscuits are a fun bake with the kids. Laced with orange (or use lemon if you prefer), they are easy to put together with no mixer required. Just ensure your butter is very soft. As a final flourish, drizzle them with melted milk chocolate.
These biscuits are a hybrid of a cookie with a brandy snap. They would make a lovely gift – crunchy, nutty and nicely chewy with half the biscuit dipped in chocolate. They are made in one saucepan, so no beating or whisking is involved. Store for up to two days in an airtight container in a cool cupboard – they go a bit soggy if left in the fridge.
Rustled up in 15 minutes, these biscuits have a crumbly, soft texture. The dough is made in a pan, adding the dry ingredients to melted butter, sugar and golden syrup. This is an easy store cupboard recipe. The biscuits will keep for up to four days in an airtight container.
Biscotti are little Italian biscuits which are twice baked. They are quite crunchy, and are traditionally served dipped into a coffee or a glass of sweet wine. Here, pistachios replace the usual almonds, to add a lovely colour. There's some dried apricot in there, too, but you could add dried cranberries. They will keep for two weeks in an airtight container and make a lovely gift.
These small buttery lemon biscuits made with polenta, or fine cornmeal flour, have a slightly crunchy texture. The dough is quite wet, so rather than rolling it, it needs to be piped on to the baking sheet. Use a disposable piping bag and put it into a measuring jug, pulling the wide end of the bag around the sides for easy filling.
Here's a really chocolatey cookie, made with gluten-free flour and maple syrup and agave nectar, instead of sugar. The dough is quite sticky, so the easiest way to transfer the raw dough to the baking sheet is to use a measuring spoon or ice cream scoop dipped in flour, so it doesn't stick, and you'll have even-sized cookies.
A custard cream is a British favourite, and it's been around for over a hundred years. It really is a biscuit for custard-lovers – both the dough and the creamy filling use custard powder. The dough is best made in a food processor to save time and effort. Make sure you give the dough at least 20 minutes in the fridge before rolling it out.
For the ultimate indulgence, this combination of a crumbly biscuit base, topped with caramel and dark chocolate is a winner. This recipe is vegan, using a dairy-free butter, but feel free to use real butter. Although this is a simple speedy recipe, the decorated shortbread needs two hours in the fridge to allow it to set fully.
Lightly spiced with ground ginger, cinnamon and mixed spice, these crumbly, buttery, honey biscuits are perfect with a coffee. They are easy to make, and although the recipe makes 20 biscuits, they will keep for up four days in an airtight container.
A brookie is a chocolate chip cookie crossed with a brownie. It's soft and squidgy in the centre, crisp on the outside. You can use crunchy or smooth peanut butter, but the crunchy version does add more to the texture. It's best made with very dark chocolate, at least 70%, so it's not too sweet. Just be careful to melt the chocolate slowly and gently in a bain-marie (bowl over simmering water), so it doesn't overheat and seize up.
Get the recipe for chocolate and peanut butter brookies here
This is a crisp, crumbly shortbread with a difference. As well as some olive oil, ground almonds are added which make it richer and more buttery. Because the dough is rich, it needs to be chilled for a few hours before rolling out. These are lovely as they are, but make a perfect accompaniment to fresh berries or a berry compote.
Rich, chewy and soft, this cookie recipe makes 16 large cookies. So you could always freeze half the dough for another time. Roll it into a cylinder in a sheet of cling film, wrap well and freeze. From frozen, you can slice it into rounds and bake. Just add a few more minutes to the cooking time.
Bourbon biscuits have been a British favourite since the beginning of the last century. They're basically a chocolate sandwich – thin rectangular chocolate biscuits, sandwiched with a chocolate butter cream. They are easy to make, will keep for up to a week in an airtight container, and the baked, filled biscuits freeze well, too.
Fun to make during the festive season, you can still enjoy gingerbread biscuits all year. Just use different cutters and decorations. The dough is so easy – all made in one pan, with no whisking required. Decorating them will keep the kids occupied for hours!
This is the French version of a shortbread or sugar cookie, with dark chocolate chips added. Sablé means sandy, which gives an idea of the crumbly texture. The trick is not to overwork the dough, or you'll end up with a tougher biscuit rather a soft, crumbly one.
Here's the perfect biscuit everyone will love. Ready in 20 minutes, the buttery, caramel, peanut dough is made in one pan and they're really quick to bake. Once cool, dip in melted dark chocolate. Use baking parchment or a silicone sheet to line your baking trays to ensure they don't stick.
Get the recipe for salted peanut and chocolate Florentines here
The old favourites are always worth re-discovering. Crumbly, buttery shortbread contains just five ingredients, which you're bound to have in the cupboard – butter, sugar, flour, cornflour and salt. You don't have to roll it either. Just press into a tin, allow to bake then cut into triangles or circles while still hot and allow to cool.
These twice-baked Italian biscuits are perfect with a coffee or cup of tea at any time of day. If dried figs are not your thing, you could substitute dried apricots or cranberries, and you could also replace the pistachios with almonds or hazelnuts. They will keep for up to two weeks in an airtight container.
With dark chocolate chips, brown sugar and chopped walnuts, these cookies have a hint of toffee in them. Walnuts go rancid very quickly, so store any opened packets in the freezer. Alternatively, pecans make these biscuits a little sweeter. If you toast the nuts before chopping, the cookies will have a more intense, nutty taste.
For a fancy twist on a classic British Bourbon biscuit, this is a recipe for when you have more time, as the chocolate biscuit dough needs plenty of chilling. Instead of the standard chocolate buttercream filling, pipe the edges with a creamy chocolate almond mixture, then add cherry jam to the centre.
These tasty cookies are quite delicate, so the dough is cooked as a whole piece, rather than being cut into shapes beforehand. Once out of the oven, they need cutting while warm but should be left to cool completely before lifting the biscuits. For the festive season, our recipe cuts them into cute reindeer shapes before decorating.
Small tubes of writing icing will make decorating these biscuits so easy. The recipe works for any time of year, so feel free to be creative with your decorating! There's a lightly spiced dough to make, where an electric hand whisk will save time. The recipe makes around 30 biscuits, so you may want to freeze some.
Achieve cookie-decorating perfection with our step-by-step guide to making royal icing with decorating techniques and tips. The cookie dough is a chocolate gluten-free mixture which is quick and easy to make.
Using dark muscovado sugar in these very chocolatey cookies gives them a slightly toffee-caramel taste. The recipe offers plenty of options to make twists to the basics, with the addition of coconut, peanut butter, banana or oats. The possibilities are endless for chocolate chip cookie enthusiasts.