lavender shortbread cookies
words and recipe by Chloe Chappe @moonbeam_kitchen
I adapted this recipe from Heidi Swanson’s rosewater shortbread cookies during college and it has come to be known as my signature cookie. I’ve made them for potlucks, for a photo show my sister had at a local café, as holiday presents, and for friends. The olive oil used as a carrier oil for the lavender oil add extra richness to the cookie
ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon lavender flowers
- ½ pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
- ½ cup sugar
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons olive oil (used as carrier oil for the lavender oil)
- 2-4 drops lavender oil
- Extra sugar and lavender flowers for garnish
- Parchment paper
- Fun shaped cookie cutter (such as a heart or a hand shaped cutter)
directions
- Mix flour, salt, and lavender flowers in a large bowl.
- Pour olive oil into small bowl, put 2 drops of lavender oil. Taste with pinky, if it doesn’t taste very strongly of lavender add one more drop but be careful not to make the mixture bitter. Mix oils well.
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In a separate bowl, beat lavender oil, sugar and butter together with electric beaters until smooth. Add the flour mixture until just combined. Roll the dough into a ball, wrap it in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for at least three hours.
- Once fully chilled, cut the dough into quarters, rolling one out at a time. Sprinkle flour on your rolling surface, then roll out dough to a half-inch thickness. Cut out hearts or whatever shape you are using, place the hearts on the cookie sheet, an inch apart and sprinkle sugar and lavender flowers in the center of each cookie. Before baking, place the cookie sheet with cut cookies in the freezer for 5-10 minutes.
- Take the cookie sheet out of the freezer and bake for 10-13 minutes, placing one sheet on the top rack and one on the middle rack of the oven. Check on the cookies at around 7 minutes for brownness and switch the cookie sheets, from top to middle and vice versa. Once the edges are slightly golden, take cookies out and chill on a rack for