How to use the online timer
Twelve minutes is a tray of biscuits, and the thing worth knowing in advance is that they come out looking underdone. Edges set and lightly coloured, centres still soft and pale: that is the point to take them out. A biscuit that looks finished in the oven has already gone past crisp and into hard, and there is no undoing it once the tray is on the rack.
Bake one tray at a time on the middle shelf if the oven has hot spots, or swap and turn the trays halfway if you are running two. Give the dough real space, because biscuits spread more than anyone expects. The count runs in this browser tab, so leave the page open rather than closing it while you portion the next batch.
A hot tray keeps cooking after it leaves the oven. Two or three minutes on the tray lets the biscuits firm up enough to move without breaking, and then they need a wire rack — left on the metal, they carry on baking from underneath. Chilling the dough before it goes in also limits the spread and gives a thicker, chewier result.
Common questions
They look underdone when the timer goes. Is that right?
Usually yes. Set edges and a soft, pale centre is the point to take them out, because a hot tray carries on cooking them. Biscuits that look finished in the oven will be hard once cool.
How do I stop them spreading into each other?
Chill the dough before baking and leave real space between the pieces. Warm dough on a warm tray spreads much further than expected, and a tray reused straight from the oven makes it worse.
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