What do Santa’s elves make sandwiches with?

        It’s nearly Christmas, and I missed it last year on my blog. I said it was because I was just too busy, but as experienced by many people around the world during the holidays, I get blue during winter and the holidays. I think it’s the lack of sunshine for one. I just can’t function without it. But then there is the god-awful job market. It’s been nearly a year and I still haven’t found a replacement job. But I really think it’s because my father died 22 days before Christmas from a terminal illness the year I turned 14. I think it still affects my ability in some way to really get excited about Christmas. I am making the decision to pull myself up by my bootstraps and get out of this nearly 6 month (ughhh) writing funk I’ve been in.

        So I’ve been listening to my self-prescribed daily dose of Christmas music at maximum volume, and at times, singing along. I put up the Christmas tree and decorations the weekend after Thanksgiving (to the very loud protest of my husband, the Grinch) and this week I start baking.  I made cranberry chutney for neighbor gifts during Thanksgiving, but it’s the sweets that really make the season. The problem is sweets really give me a tummy ache and sometimes a toothache so I lean toward the lesser sweet items during the year, but Christmas calls for pulling out the big guns - Paula Deans of butter and pounds of sugar. Today Shortbread made the top of the Must-Make List. I love shortbread. So sweet and buttery and smooth and tender – especially with a hot cup of coffee…excuse me for a minute while I go top off my cup.

        So…back again. Where was I? Oh yes, Shortbread. I really think this cookie gets the short stick (hehe!) due to the copious amounts of tinned cookies pressed on unwitting recipients during the holidays. They are mass produced beginning December 26^th until the next holiday season, and left to dry out in warehouses across the globe. They are intensely scratchy to the roof of your mouth from the decorative sugar glued on top. If you can find a whole one to bite into it is guaranteed to immediately crumble to dust (come to think of it they usually taste like dust – I wonder if the FDA requires them to disclose how the percentage of sawdust they use?) and then they are often fake buttery (hydrogenated mystery oil anyone? Yum!). So I have made it my mission to find the best recipes and smash them all together to make a really good cookie.

        I don’t want a crumbly cookie, but I do want it to be traditionally on the dry, crisp side while still remaining tender and sweet. I want real butter and I want it to melt on your tongue if you don’t want to chew it immediately (I love that part!). The real butter helps a lot with that. But keeping it crisp and dry without it being sawdust is not an easy feat.  I have tried so many recipes and chicken scratched so many notes, I can’t give full credit to anyone really except Cooks Illustrated for the majority of how to pull the ingredients together (They really nailed it with this one… – Shocker? – Nope) BTW…I absolutely adore the dark chocolate and crystallized ginger (or candied orange peel) ones – and I will take full credit for that improvisation!

Recipe (Printable Recipe)

Dry Ingredients

• 1⅛ cup whole wheat flour, oat flour, graham flour, almond meal, or other nut meal
•  2 ¾ cups all purpose flour
•  ⅔ cup cornstarch
•  2 cups powdered sugar
•  1¼ tsp salt
•  ⅛ to ¼ cup crystallized ginger or candied orange peel chopped really fine (optional)

Wet Ingredients

• 2 cups of butter, diced into ¼ inch cubes (Yep – that’s a Paula Dean of butter! - Keep chilled until ready to use)

Decorating Ingredients

•  Dark Chocolate for dipping (optional)

Directions

Preheat your oven to 450^o F.

In a stand mixer, using the paddle attachment, mix all of the dry ingredients.

Add the butter and blend for 5-10 minutes scraping down the sides. 

Depending on how warm your kitchen is, this can really vary. It took mine nearly 9 minutes.  You will know when the mixture is ready when it clumps in large batches and pulls away from the sides.  Then blend for 1 minute more.

 Divide the dough into 2 even rounds and press into the bottom of 2, 9 inch, cake pans. You can use the bottom of a glass or a spatula to press the dough out. Then smooth the surface of the dough out with the heal of your palm because the imbalances will cause uneven cooking and will also show in the finished product. 

Cut out a 1-2 inch round of dough from the center of each pan to allow it to spread in the oven. You can still bake these rounds to eat midway through your cooking process.

Bake for 5 minutes on 450^o F, and then reduce the oven temp to 250^o F and bake for another 15 minutes. 

Turn off the oven and remove the shortbread. Leaving the shortbread in the cake pans, score them into 8^ths for gifting (they are less fragile) and into 16^ths for cookie platters. Then pinprick the tops all the way through to the bottom with a skewer. Depending on the size of the wedge you will pinprick each wedge 10-20 times.

Return the shortbread to the oven for drying with the oven propped opened 1 inch for an hour.  Then cool the shortbreads on the counter for 2 hours or so. At this point they can be candy coated in dark chocolate if you’ve added crystallized ginger or candied orange peel or eaten as is, preferably with a cup of cocoa, chai or coffee. Yummy!