Easy Chocolate Shortbread Cookies Recipe | Christmas Cookies Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What is the secret to making good shortbread cookies? ›

Eggs: Butter cookies and sugar cookies typically contain eggs, while shortbread cookies can be made with or without eggs. The egg makes the dough more pliable and less crumbly. Texture: Sugar cookies have a more moist texture than butter cookies, and shortbread is more crumbly than butter cookies.

The most common mistakes when making shortbread are over-working the dough, and incorporating too much flour. The less you work the dough, the more crumbly and melt-in-your-mouth your shortbread cookies will be.

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.

Not necessarily. Refrigeration for 30 minutes with any cookie helps hold the shape, but it's not necessary with this particular shortbread recipe. If you're concerned there is not enough flour, causing these to spread and loose their shape, then by all means refrigerate first, then bake.

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.

If you don't have salted butter, unsalted butter will also work, simply add about ¼ teaspoon of salt to the cookie dough. The reason the salt is needed is because salt brings out the flavor in the cookies, without it, your cookies will taste bland.

Americans are the outlier on how we use "biscuit"

To most of the rest of the English-speaking world, a biscuit is what Americans would refer to as either a cookie or a cracker. Biscuits can be sweet (shortbread) or savory.

Sugar provides a fast source of energy. There are rarely any artificial additives. Cons: Shortbread is a weight watcher's nightmare because it is extremely high in saturated fat and calories.

What happens if you add too much butter to shortbread cookies? ›

Butter is an emulsifier and it makes cookies tender. It also adds in the crispy-around-the-edges element. Adding too much butter can cause the cookies to be flat and greasy. Adding too little butter can cause the cookies to be tough and crumbly.

Remove the wrap if you've used it, then use a fork to prick ("dock") the dough all over; this allows any steam to escape, and prevents the shortbread from bubbling as it bakes. Prick the dough in a random pattern, or create a pretty design.

But in this shortbread cookie recipe, it really makes a difference. Chilling the dough helps the cookies hold their shape. If you don't chill your shortbread dough, the cookies will spread as they bake.

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.

The word "bread" comes from "biscuit bread" which was made from leftover bread dough that was sweetened and dried out in the oven to make biscuits. Why do you poke holes in shortbread? The holes allow the moisture to escape during baking and more even heat distribution. This helps dry out and crisp up the cookies.

Adding hard-boiled egg yolks to a basic shortbread recipe makes cookies more tender with the perfect buttery-soft texture. The addition is a sure-fire way to improve the texture of your cookies, but perhaps not always worth the extra time and effort.

These proportions make shortbread a lot more dense compared to cookies, which means you could easily end up with shortbread that's hard and crunchy rather than buttery and crumbly. Per Cooktop Cove, this can occur when the dough has either been overworked or not chilled for long enough.