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Whether it’s a plain malted milk or a fancy pastry cream, a good cup of tea isn’t complete without a biscuit for dipping.
Now that International Biscuit Day is here, one big question remains: What’s the best cookie for dipping?
Researchers at the University Hospital of Wales set out to answer this important question and completed a rigorous dunk test involving four popular varieties.
Their results showed that the humble Hobnob is the best cookie for dipping, followed closely by the Digestive.
“Biscuit dunking has a beneficial effect on tea cooling and should be encouraged, and the oat biscuit was best at achieving this compared to digestive, rich tea and shortie,” the team wrote in their study.
Whether it’s a plain malted milk or a fancy pastry cream, a good cup of tea isn’t complete without a biscuit for dipping. Now that International Biscuit Day is here, one big question remains: What’s the best cookie for dipping?
For the study, published in the BMJthe researchers tested four popular cookies – Oat, Digestive, Shortie and Rich Tea – in the ultimate dunk test.
While acknowledging that chocolate-covered and cream-filled varieties are popular, they decided to exclude them from the study.
“We narrowed down our choice of cookies, excluding chocolate and cream varieties with their potential for high desirability, because we felt it was important to limit the distractions and possible finger licking that commonly occur when eating cookies with cream or chocolate fillings,” the team, led by Ceri Jones, wrote.
Once the biscuits were selected, a standard ‘NHS-style’ concoction was made for the test.
To prepare this, the team poured 240 ml of freshly boiled water over a single tea bag in an unheated mug.
This was gently stirred for 60 seconds, before the tea bag was gently squeezed and removed.
Finally, 40 ml of semi-skimmed cow’s milk was added, straight from the refrigerator.
The most dunkable biscuit is an oat biscuit, which comes out earlier than a digestive biscuit, rich tea biscuit and a shortie
After the perfect cuppa was made, it was time to dunk.
The team rated each cookie on six factors: time to drinkable tea (TTDT), nutritional value, satiety volume, crunch reduction, dunk break point, and pragmatic dunk break point.
Perhaps the most important test – the pragmatic breakpoint test – saw the biscuits dipped in the tea for two seconds, before being held off the cup to see how long it took to break.
In this test, the oat cookie took the top prize and remained intact for a whopping 29 seconds.
The Shortie lasts for 17.5 seconds, while the Digestive falls apart after just 8.5 seconds.
At the back came the Rich Tea, which only held together for a disappointing two seconds.
Considering all six tests, the oat cookie was voted the best for dipping.
“The oat biscuit took first place after all six tests,” said the team.
“Digestion came second—it collapsed in three tests of absorbency and structural integrity (saturation volume, dunk breakpoint, and pragmatic dunk breakpoint).
‘The shortie was third, while the rich tea (the only cookie to receive demerits) was fourth; the penalty points had no direct influence on the ranking of the rich tea.’