Easy Vanilla Slice For Less Than Fifty Cents Per Serve

My mother-in-law is a pretty cluey gal. Each time we visit the ‘laws I find myself poring through her old cookbooks, many of them written in her own hand. This past weekend, she pulled this recipe out of thin air and I knew I had to have it. It was originally from an old (um, sometime in the eighties? early nineties? LOL) Australian Women’s Weekly cakes and slices cookbook. MIL’s copy was falling apart at the seams, another testament to the fact that most Aussie households use their AWW cookbooks continuously. Aussies can follow the recipe exactly as they’ll be familiar with the brands. Overseas folk may have a harder time but similar products should be available. I’m also including a rough estimate of cost, although of course this would be different for those living outside of Australia.

Easy Vanilla Slice
Serves 10 (approx)

250g (a little under 9oz) packet Milk Coffee biscuits (cookies - see below for example)
300ml (10 oz) thickened cream
250ml (8½ oz) milk
100g (3½ oz) packet vanilla-flavoured instant pudding (see below for example)

Icing:
1 cup icing sugar (confectioner’s sugar)
1 teaspoon soft butter
* food colouring to suit (or you could leave it out - I will next time)
* hot water

Method:

1. Cover the base of a 23cm (9 inch) square slab pan with biscuits (cookies), plain side down. (You could any kind of sweet biscuit for this recipe but because it is such a rich dessert, plainer is probably better. Milk Coffee biscuits are very plain). You might need to break some biscuits up to fit your pan - they should completely cover the base.
2. Combine cream and milk in a large bowl. Add pudding mix and use an electric beater (or a really good arm) to beat on medium speed for 1 minute or until nice and thick.
3. Pour pudding mix over biscuit base.
4. Top with another layer of biscuits, plain side down, filling in any gaps with broken-up pieces.
5. Stick it in the fridge while you make up the icing. Just rub the butter into the icing sugar a little and then use the hot water to form a smooth paste. You want it easily spreadable. Add a couple drops of food colouring if you want.
6. Top the slice with the icing and (if you can wait that long) stick it back in the fridge to properly set overnight. It’s good to eat in about one hour though.

Cost Breakdown (in Aussie prices)

Vanilla-flavoured instant pudding - $1.11
Cream - $1.14
Milk Coffee biscuits - $1.79
Milk (1 cup) - $0.32 (approx)
Icing sugar (1 cup) - $0.40 (approx)
Butter (I used margarine), tsp - $0.03 (approx)
Food colouring - $0.05 (approx)

Total Cost - $4.84, or 48c per serve

As I said, very rich, but oh-so-decadent at the same time. You could switch things up a bit by using instant chocolate pudding mix and then drizzling melted chocolate atop white icing. Yummo!