Fox's Chocolate & Vanilla Creams - 200g

Cream biscuits hold a particular rank in the British biscuit cupboard. Too ordinary to put out for the vicar, far too good to be left at the back. They are elevenses, the four o'clock cup of tea, the thing you reach for while the kettle is still deciding whether to boil.

Out here, it is rarely about needing a biscuit. It is about needing that biscuit: the exact snap, the exact filling, the exact moment with a mug in the other hand. You can describe it to a Canadian friend for ten minutes and still not get it across, so it is easier to hand them one.

The packet is 200g, a mix of chocolate and vanilla, and it sits happily in a cool, dry cupboard until someone finds it. Once it is open, fold the end over and clip it, though in most houses that step is optional because the packet does not survive the evening.

Most people put a box of British tea bags in the basket alongside, which is fair, since a cream biscuit without tea is only half the job. Add a couple of other packets and you have the start of a proper biscuit tin.