Sick of Sourdough? Let's Make Cookies!

When the Pandemic first hit last spring, there was a wave (no - to be clear - a tsunami) of interest in baking bread at home. Customers came to the store everyday in droves looking for flour, yeast and baking products. They were watching YOUTUBE to learn how to make bread and I had many conversations with customers on how to proof yeast, the proper way to rise the flour, and then the temperature to bake at (I like 375 myself).

Well, not surprisingly, people want to bake other things as we settle in for the winter months and I suggest that cookies may be the right thing to do this time around. Everyone likes cookies, they can be very easy to do, and they fit with the Holiday theme of gift giving. A home made gift makes quite the impression on a relative or friend quarantined at home.

Here is very simple cookie recipe that uses only 7 ingredients of which two are butter and salt. Come on folks. It doesn't get any easier than this and you can find everything here at our store with a quick in and out to boot! Bon Appetit!

INGREDIENTS

• 2 limes

• 1 ½ cups/190 grams all-purpose flour

• ⅔ cup/60 grams fine cornmeal

• ⅔ cup/130 grams granulated sugar

• 1 teaspoon fine sea salt

• 1 cup/225 grams cold, unsalted butter (2 sticks), cut into 1-inch chunks

• ½ cup/60 grams confectioners’ sugar

PREPARATION

1. Heat oven to 325 degrees. Grate 1 teaspoon zest from the limes. (You can usually get 1 teaspoon from 1 lime, but you may need to grate some zest off the other.) Add to a food processor.

2. Add flour, cornmeal, sugar and salt and pulse once or twice to combine. Add butter and pulse until the mixture resembles fine crumbs. Pulse a few more times until some of the crumbs start to come together, but don’t over-process the dough. It should be somewhat crumbly and not form a ball. (Alternatively, you can mix this in a bowl using two knives, or use a pastry cutter to mix the butter into the flour.)

3. Press the dough into an even layer in an ungreased, fluted 9-inch tart pan with a removable bottom or in a 9-inch pie pan. Prick the dough all over with a fork. Bake until golden brown, about 40 to 50 minutes.

4. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Using a butter knife, cut the shortbread into 12 wedges while still warm.

5. Make the glaze: Halve the zested lime and squeeze 1 tablespoon juice into a small bowl. Whisk in confectioners’ sugar and, if you like, more lime juice to taste. (More lime juice will make the glaze thinner and more tart, while less lime juice yields a thicker, sweeter glaze.) Drizzle glaze over the cooled shortbread, then zest the second lime over the icing before it sets. (Use a citrus zester, if you have one, or a regular zester, if you don’t.)