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Lala's Legacy: Shortbread


I just finished organizing Lala's recipes into categories:

  • drinks
  • salads
  • dinners
  • desserts
There's more to it than that but for the sake of simplicity, this is where I've left it.  There are more than 300 hand-written recipes, and at least as many newspaper and magazine clippings featuring timeless classics, food that only a nuclear family post WWII would prepare and serve, and everything in between.  

Today I felt like making something using simple ingredients, and did not want to run to the grocery store to pick up something random and not already in the pantry or fridge.  This three ingredient recipe for Shortbread couldn't have been more perfect for the day.


Given that I'm down to my last two sticks of butter, I decided to halve this recipe.  If we had company on the horizon, or were attending a function where I was asked to bring a dessert, I would be certain to make a full recipe, or even double it.



In the video above, the butter and sugar are creamed together.  This isn't any different than most baking recipes that call for creaming the butter and sugar together.  The video below shows the dough just as it starts to form a ball.  Initially, it has a crumb texture, but over time it develops into a ball.  



The next step is to flatten the dough onto a floured bread board.  In lieu of a board, I opted for a sheet of parchment paper and the cookie tray.  As long as you don't press too hard with your cutter, this shouldn't be a problem.  


I do not have a small cookie cutter, just a large pizza cutter.  In a pinch, it worked just fine. As for the dents with a fork as the recipe describes, my Mother has made shortbread and always poked it with a fork to let the steam escape and prevent too much rise.  Since I cut the cookies with my pizza cutter before using the fork, I found adding dents to be too complicated and opted for poking with the tines instead.  In the future, I would consider denting and then cutting to see if this achieves a more desired result. 




My oven tends to take about twice as long to bake anything, so it's hard for me to know if it's my oven or the recipe that needs tweaking as far as time.  I did not separate the cookies but rather left them as a "bar" as seen above.  I wanted to see golden edges to know it was ready.  In my oven, this total baking time was 26 minutes.  I would recommend you check your shortbread starting at the 10 minute mark and every two minutes thereafter until you achieve that beautiful, honey-golden color it's known to have.  In my oven, at the 20 minute mark the edges were just starting to turn a more golden color.  



Once the cookies shortbread came out of the oven, I was at a loss for whether I should break the cookies apart at this juncture, or let them cool before piecing them along what are now the scored lines (I had previously cut them with the pizza cutter).  It was very much a Great British Baking Show moment for me, as this was my first time with this recipe.  I referenced my Mom's recipe (see photo below) to have a better idea of what to do.  After looking at her recipe, it's no wonder it took the shortbread so long to bake!  Her recipe says to bake for 1 hr at 300*F.  I especially love that in bold letters across the bottom she wrote, "YOU CAN CUT EASIER WHILE HOT".  The photo above shows them out of the oven, and recut with the pizza cutter.  The photos below shows cutter cut cookies on the right, and hand cut (using the scored lines) cookies on the left.  I would recommend using the cutter.  The cookies were very hot to handle, and did not break consistently.



As the recipe is simple, I'm going to keep this post short and to the point.  If you make this, please let me know how it turns out in the comments below.  And as always, remember to follow Caught Red Threaded on Facebook and Instagram for exclusive offers and ideas.  Happy baking!


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