Shortbread Cookie Recipe {& Alice in Wonderland Cookies} (2024)
By marian406 Comments
I have yummy news! I’m ready to share another recipe with you… A recipe I like to use as cookie decorating base… Melt-in-your-mouth, delicious, buttery shortbread.
The taste difference between it and my sugar cookie recipe is subtle, but this one definitely tastes like a traditional shortbread, and *gasp* has one whole cup of cornstarch in it! I couldn’t believe it when I first made it, and was a little doubtful about how successful the recipe would be, but it turns out that the cornstarch in this version of shortbread is what helps give the cookie a ‘melt-in-your-mouth’ sensation.Thanks to my dear friend Kim whom I adore, for sharing her family’s recipe with me… She’s not on-line, but she’s crazy about baking too, and we’ve experienced many sweet adventures together.
The original shortbread isn’t made with cornstarch and has quite an interesting history, b.t.w., and as it’s often served with tea, I thought it would be fun to make a few Alice in Wonderland decorated cookies with it.
Kind of fitting with the whole tea time thing, are these Alice in Wonderland cookies. I can’t wait to make a whole series of otherAlice characters, but for now I’m excited to be starting a series of just princess cookies copied fromthis piece of art.{Thank you, suisei-ojii-sama!} It’s the beginning of another theme I’m looking forward to playing around with… Cookies based on fairy tales, fables and nursery rhymes. There are so many inspirational images and characters out there, I’m looking forward to getting going on these! Besides making a fairytale or fable princess cookie or two each month, I’d like to also do a more extensive collection here and there, like Jack and Jill nursery rhyme cookies.
Do you have a fairytale, fable or nursery rhyme favorite? Which would you like to see cookies made of? Do you have any beautiful images of your favorites you’d like to share?
I haven’t forgotten about the travel theme either… Thanks so much for your amazing suggestions! I have so many great ideas now, thanks to you!
And before I share the yum, yum, yum shortbread cookie recipe, if you’re here trying to decide which recipe you’d like to try for your decorated cookies, I thought I’d do a little comparison between two similar recipes for you, shortbread and sugar cookies.
I noticed a few key differences between this shortbread and my sugar cookie recipe, which I’ll share with you in case you’d like to make them too:
The texture of the shortbread dough after mixing is smooth and easy to eat work with. The sugar cookie recipe is a stickier dough, and needs to be rolled between parchment and chilled to be able to work with. The taste is worth it though! Both taste scrumptious, in my humble opinion, but the shortbread cookie is easier to make and work with.
The shortbread melt-in-your mouth taste is yummy, but it means thecookies break easier, unfortunately. They’re fine to serve in a bakery, for a function, give to friends etc., but if I were shipping cookies, I would choose the sugar cookie recipe.
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Here’s the recipe if you’d like to try it out:
{Click to print}
A few sweet morsels of information I’d love to share with you:
The Alice cookie shape was made by hand cutting the dough with a paring knife. Easy enough to do if you’re only doing a few cookies, but a heads-up in case you don’t already know, time-consuming if you’re doing a lot of them. There’s got to be a cutter out there you could use though (drop me a line please if you see one), or even just pipe her on a rectangular cookie.
I used a Kopykake projector to help me pipe Alice’s shape.
Click here for the royal icing recipe I used.
Wouldn’t these adorable Alice in Wonderlandprintables from The TomKat Studio be perfect for a Wonderland party?! I’m thinking that when I make Alice cookies again (with more of the characters and images), I’ll need to attach these sweet tags from TomKat’s shop to the cookie bags.
If you’d like to make these Alice cookies as a gift, but don’t have the time to make too many, wouldn’t these be a nice added touch? Just had to share with you!
A new Sweet of the Month is up! I’ve changed it to monthly in order to give you more time to vote and more time to prepare if you’re interested in entering. You can find more information on the Sweet of the Month in the FAQ section and can vote for your favorite sweets HERE until February 18th, and if you’d like to enter into the next contest, watch out for a post announcing the dates. I’m thinking maybe we’ll make the next one a Spring/Easter theme.
Drop me a line below, do you have a fairytale, fable or nursery rhyme favorite? Which would you like to see cookies made of? Do you have any beautiful images of your favorites you’d like to share?
The Eat Me Cookies are magical ones that make anyone grow giant size. They first appear right near Alice in a box by the Doorknob so she could try one of them to grow to reach the key on the table (also summoned by the Doorknob).
Step 3: The Secret to the Absolute Best Shortbread
After shaping the cookies, don't rush to the oven! Instead, chill the dough in the refrigerator for 30 minutes or so (overnight is OK, too). A short stay in the fridge will firm up the cookies and solidify the butter. This will help keep them from spreading too much.
Compared to butter cookies, shortbread uses a higher ratio of butter to flour, and is baked at a lower temperature. This gives it its signature delicate consistency that crumbles in the mouth when bitten. It's also often baked in a pan and cut up after baking, rather than being cut into shapes before baking.
Soon her eye fell on a little glass box that was lying under the table: she opened it, and found in it a very small cake, on which the words “EAT ME” were beautifully marked in currants.
The key with shortbread is not to overhandle it. Make the dough exactly as instructed, but don't mess around making shapes or over rolling the dough - you will end up with delicious but tough biscuits. Stretching and pulling the dough activates the gluten in the flour, making chewy cookies and not crisp ones.
Spend extra when it really counts: If you're making a recipe where butter really is the star (think shortbread or biscuits), splashing out for a package of Kerrygold or Vital Farms is worth the expense. The fine differences in the flavor are most impactful in these recipes.
Traditional Scottish shortbread is a simple recipe made with sugar, butter, flour, and salt. Other shortbread styles will include leavening agents like baking powder and baking soda, which makes them crisp instead of crumbly like traditional Scottish shortbread.
This unexpected addition will make buttery confections like shortbreads and shortcakes even more tender and flaky. “Biscuits should be crumbly, buttery and sweet,” reads a headnote for a cinnamon sugar-spiced shortbread recipe in the Ritz London Cookbook.
Cornstarch provides the shortbread with structure, but its biggest job is keeping the cookies extra soft, tender, and light. I love adding a small amount to chocolate chip cookies too. Optional Coarse Sugar Topping: For an optional sparkly crunch on your shortbread wedges, add a sprinkle of coarse sugar before baking.
These days salted butter is of equal quality to unsalted, however using unsalted butter allows you to control the amount of salt in the cookies which enhances the flavour but can be overpowering in a delicately flavoured cookie. Christmas baking is a lot of work - to get the best results use the best ingredients.
If you're wondering why recipes usually call for unsalted butter even though they just add the salt back in it's because different brands of butter use different amounts of salt. Calling for unsalted butter is just a way of helping to ensure similar results no matter which brands of ingredients you use.
To make a copycat version of Chessmen cookies at home, the recipe is a simple butter cookie cut out in a special shape. A butter cookie is slightly different from shortbread but with a higher ratio of sugar to butter. This allows a butter cookie to hold its shape rather than having a tendency to crumble.
These Alice in Wonderland 'Eat Me' Cookies come in a variety of shapes and sizes, and each has a unique flavor. Be very careful in choosing which one to eat first, you might find yourself taking on a variety of shapes and sizes as well!
Food. Starting with a bottle (“DRINK ME”) that makes Alice shut up like a telescope, and a cake (“EAT ME”) that turns her into a giant, Carroll's story often returns to the subject of food and drink.
She then found out an Upelkuchen cake with "Eat Me" written on it and ate a small part of it. She grew up enormously, to the point of reaching the ceiling of the Room of Doors. Later, in the Red Queen's castle, the White Rabbit gave to her a piece of an Upelkuchen cake he had with him.
Introduction: My name is Terence Hammes MD, I am a inexpensive, energetic, jolly, faithful, cheerful, proud, rich person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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