Variations on Shortbreads

I admit it.  I am a cookie monster...  and a bit of a connoisseur at that.  I got so fed up with the artificial and tasteless junk being pushed out by the big bakeries and manufacturers this winter, that I decided to just start making my own.  Having been away from the cooking/baking world for a while I decided to start simple:


I love good shortbread cookies because they are buttery, not too sweet, a little salty and easy to make.  One basic recipe:

2 Cups of flour
2 sticks of unsalted butter
1/2 cup of sugar
1/2 teaspoon of vanilla
1/2 teaspoon of salt

• Chop each stick of butter into small pieces (about 8 1 tbsps. pieces per stick)
• Add everything but the flour
• Cream ingredients (blend at high speed)
• Add and mix flour(set blender to low speed before adding flour)
• Drop dough onto a long sheet of  plastic wrap.
• Trim into a log shape cutting and shifting pieces as necessary
• Wrap the dough in the plastic wrap and roll on a flat surface until you have a log about  3
  " inches in diameter.
• Use a knife to cut 1/2 inch sections
• Place on a baking sheet and shape into rough disks
• Bake at 325 for 12-14 minutes

Starting with this basis, I began researching how to adapt it to include some of my favorite things:  Cocoa (not too sweet and a bit salty), cherries and walnuts.  Skipping several weeks of experimentation, here is the final version:

Cocoa, Cherry Walnut Shortbreads
2 sticks of unsalted butter
1 cup of sugar
1 1/4 to 1 1/2 tsp of salt
6 tablespoons of Hershey's Cocoa (if using some other cocoa use enough to make 3 servings)
1/4 to 1/2 tsp of cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp of vanilla
1/3 to 1/2 cup of water (depends on a few things discussed below)

2 cups of flour

8 oz of dried tart cherries
1/2 cup of walnuts (opt)
1/2 cup of golden raisins (opt)

The cherries can be prepared several ways:

1. Use them as is (dry).  This will make them tougher in the cookie.
2. Rehydrate them:  Heat to a simmer in a small pot for about 30 minutes using just enough water to float the cherries and keep them from burning.  If you do this, save the resulting juice and use this in place of the water required for the recipe.
3. As per option 2 except add 1 tsp of butter and your cinnamon for the recipe here instead.

Using rehydrated cherries will reduce the amount of water/juice required by 1/8th to 1/4 cup.

Likewise the walnuts can be used several ways:

1. 1. Use large pieces that you drop onto the cookies.
2. Grind into smaller pieces that can be sprinkled or just mixed into the cookie dough.
3. Fine grind into an almost flour that you mix into the dough (but this will require adding a bit more water - think about 1-2 tbsps.

Next:

• Mix all ingredients except for the water, flour, cherries, nuts and raisins in a bowl (exclude cinnamon if you are using option 3 for the cherries).
• Cream the mixture (mix at high speed).
• Slow mixer to low speed and add flour.
• Slowly add water (or juice from cooking the cherries, and if using rehydrated cherries, use no more than 1/4 cup of the juice) until the flour is absorbed and you get a nice evenly textured dough.
• If using option 2 or 3 for the walnuts, mix them in now.
• Lastly add cherries (if they have been rehydrated, cool them down first) and let them blend for only a few seconds.  If you rehydrated them you may need to add a bit of flour to the mix and the retained juices will spread into the batter as you mix them in.
• Use plastic wrap, and bake per regular shortbreads (14-15 minutes).
• If the dough is a bit runny (typically from adding warm cherries to the dough).  Place the dough in the refrigerator until it firms up (about 30 minutes).  If that doesn't work, add a bit of flour.

Notes

• We need to add the water/juice because of the cocoa.  It steals the absorptive ability of the butter.  Also fine ground nuts have the same affect.
• You can replace apricots for the cherries (think a sacher torte cookie) and continuing that thought...
• Consider a cream cheese style topping:

Cream Cheese Topping

8 oz of cream cheese

1/2 stick of unsalted butter

1/2 teaspoon of vanilla

1 cup of raw sugar

1/2 tsp of salt

Place ingredients in mixing bowl.  Cream until smooth and thoroughly blended.