Autumn is an incredible time of year.

Leaves are changing to that array of amazing hues, crisp golden leaves are floating down by our feet. If you listen carefully you can hear a flurry of fireworks and jingle bells in the distance. Oh, is that Christmas I hear?

Ha, not just yet but I’m getting my fluffy jumper and uggs ready!

That being said, I was feeling a bit under the weather over the weekend and wanted something to cheer me up. Try as I might it was something that chocolate and Bridget jones just could not do! – I needed to bake.

5am. I had my fluffy slippers and my big house coat on and boy was I ready for that cinnamon smell to hit the air. I had decided the night before that I wanted to make something that was flavoured like autumn, I didn’t want to just use cinnamon or just use cloves, the next obvious choice was mixed spice.

Mixed spice- The flavour of everything I baked in my teens. 

I thought it was a wonder spice – didn’t actually occur to me that it was a mixture of several spices until my early twenties. Oh well, flavour is flavour and this one is the Mary Berry of spices. So I had my ultimate spice mix and my love of carrots trying to break out of my head and I couldn’t think of anything better than a carrot cake biscuit.

– I know, bare with me. It’s not as crazy as it sounds.

Even the ingredients would have you believe that these are more cake-like but they really aren’t! They’re crisp and chewy and delicious. They have the texture of a flapjack with the crunchy crumbly outside of a granola, it gives it something extra that a carrot cake just wouldn’t give you.

In hindsight I would have pressed each cookie down with the back of my spoon so they were all perfectly flat and crispy but -like I said – it was 5am and I was poorly. Baking something pretty was not on my mind, I just wanted something tasty.

The photos were a spur of the moment thing as a full batch of – not so pretty- looking biscuits had already been snaffled up. These cookies, these were the photogenic ones! I’m no photographer but I think I’m getting better, what’d you think?

Needless to say, these cookies were gone in less that a few breaths, they were the only thing I ate over the weekend (I was still poorly) so I ate five in one sitting. The next morning, I crumbled some up into my muesli too and my taste buds were going crazy, it’s pretty damn good with a dash of extra cinnamon. Am I too eager for the Christmas season? Perhaps, but I’m starting it in style.

These are my new favourite snack but let’s share – What’s your favourite autumn treat?