Cream together the butter, brown sugar and golden syrup until pale and fluffy. Add the egg yolk and vanilla, and mix again to combine.

Sift the wholemeal flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, spices and a pinch of salt into the bowl. Any bran left in the sieve can be tipped into the bowl. Pulse half of the oats in a food processor to make a fine oatmeal, then add to the bowl with the remaining unprocessed oats. Mix to combine and to bring the dough together into a neat ball.

Flatten into a disc, cover with clingfilm and chill for at least 2 hours or until firm.

Lightly dust a work surface with flour and roll out the dough to a thickness of about 3mm. Using a 5cm round cutter, stamp out as many discs as you can from the dough, and arrange on 3 baking sheets, lined with baking paper (or bake in batches, if you don’t have enough trays). Gather together the dough scraps to roll and stamp out more biscuits. Chill the biscuits for 30 minutes and preheat the oven to 170°C, fan 150°C, gas 3.

Bake for 10-12 minutes until firm and golden. Leave to cool on the baking sheets for 10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack until cold and crisp.

Melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl – either in the microwave on a low setting or over a bowl of barely simmering water. Stir until smooth, then leave to cool slightly. Spoon into a piping bag, snip the end into a fine point (or use a fine writing nozzle) and drizzle chocolate all over the top of each biscuit. Leave until set firm.

For the filling, cream together the butter and icing sugar until pale and light. Add the vanilla, and mix again.

Turn half of the biscuits upside down (flat-side uppermost) and pipe a ring of buttercream around the edge of each, leaving a hole in the middle. Pipe or spoon the caramel sauce into the holes and sandwich together with the remaining biscuits.

Recipe by Annie Rigg