Dunking delights: the biscuit that soaks for more than a minute (From Worcester News)

Dunking delights: the biscuit that soaks for more than a minute

12:40pm Tuesday 1st September 2009 in News

A REVOLUTIONARY new biscuit that can be dunked for more than a minute without falling apart has been developed by a Worcestershire chef.

That means Felice Tocchini’s Worcester Feast Dunker has smashed the previous longest dunking time reported in Britain of 25.5 seconds which was achieved by a milk chocolate digestive.

The biscuit, which tastes of chocolate with cinnamon and a hint of ginger, was devised at the request of Worcester Feast, the city’s first food and drink festival, and will be officially launched when the Mayor of Worcester Councillor Andy Roberts dunks a Worcester Feast Dunker in a mug of tea at the opening ceremony on Friday.

Mr Tocchini, chef patron of Fusion Brasserie in Hawbridge, Stoulton, near Worcester, said: “The trouble with ordinary biscuits is that they were never designed to be dunked – a few seconds in hot tea or coffee and they simply disintegrate.

“There is nothing more off-putting than biscuit mush at the bottom of your mug. The Worcester Feast Dunker is made for dunking, and can be submerged in tea or coffee for twice as long as ordinary biscuits before it breaks up.”

Using his Italian biscotti know-how, Mr Tocchini has combined three ingenious ideas to enable the Worcester Feast Dunker to stay intact even in hot liquids.

Firstly, his dough, which does not contain oil or fat, is made of special ingredients including a unique blend of flour and finely sliced strands of sweet potato – the fibres of which act as reinforcement when the dough becomes saturated.

Secondly, he rolls together contrasting layers of dough to create a laminate which gives the biscuit extra structural strength when wet.

A cross section of the biscuit looks similar to plywood and the mix of doughs gives a unique wood-grain effect on the top and bottom.

Finally, the biscuit is coated during baking with a secret sugar and egg-based glaze which increases the biscuit’s water resistance.

It is claimed that in tests, the Worcester Feast Dunker routinely achieves a dunking time – that is the time the biscuit stays intact when at least half-immersed in hot tea or coffee – of one minute, although dunks of up to one minute 17 seconds have apparently been recorded.

Physicist Dr Len Fisher, a research fellow at Bristol University’s Department of Physics who has written a book called How to Dunk a Doughnut, said he thought the Worcester Feast Dunker “sounds fascinating”.