Granny Tcherkezoff’s Shortbread

I decided to make my Granny’s short bread recipe and it turned out quite well despite a couple of mess-ups on my part

Ingredients: 1/2lb (1 1/8c.) Berry Sugar, 2lb (4 1/4 c.) Flour, 1lb Butter, Pinch of Salt

Makes >48 small cookies

Directions:

Cream butter, add sugar.

Add 3/4 flour, add rest of flour on a pastry board I missed this step, didn’t pay attention. Despite the fact that I messed it up they turned out yummy, the pastry board would make it flakier in texture.

Take a plastic freezer bag or Ziploc,put your ball of dough inside, leaving the bag open roll the dough flat, pushing into edges of the bag, the dough doesn’t stick to the roller or your cutting/bread board, no extra flour needed!

This was genius it worked so well I am going to use it for my sugar cookies from now on. Choosing a bag type: Ziplocs are good if you want to keep the dough for an extended period of time refrigerated (2 days max) or in the freezer (months). Since  freezer bags are cheaper (I think?) and I was not storing my dough, the zipper was not necessary.

Once flattened it will look like this:

Avoid cracked edges by folding lumps back in and re-rolling. 

Put the flattened dough in the fridge for at least 15 minutes.

Remove from fridge and place on bread board, cut 2 edges of the bag then peel back the top layer of plastic and start punching out shapes with the cookie cutter of your choice. The shapes will peal easily off the plastic underneath and keeping the dough chilled helps them keep their shape.

Place shapes onto baking sheet and bake for 10-20 minutes at 300-320*F. I have estimated the temperature/time here because every oven heats differently. Watch your first batch closely to gauge your oven temp and timing. They should come out when the tops and edges are still pale and white and the very bottoms are slightly golden. (photo of overdone cookies)

Let cool, then place in a cookie tin or Tupperware.

The nice thing about this recipe is that these cookies age really well according to my mom, perfect for holiday baking that you can enjoy when you don’t have time to bake.

To age them I popped them in an old cookie tin with wax paper on the bottom to catch the crumbs.

Enjoy your holiday baking!