Stamped Citrus Shortbread

Back in December, after marvelling at the stunning spread of cookies in the twice-folded insert of the New York Times, the one that I most wanted to make was the stamped citrus shortbread. Only one problem: I hadn’t even heard of cookie stamps before.

While in Florida over the holiday break, I put this right by ordering a set of geometric stamps from the Nordicware Factory Direct store on eBay.

My first attempt at the recipe wasn’t entirely my own effort: I had two 5-year old helpers rolling dough and stamping. I did learn a few things though: 35g makes a really big cookie; not trimming the flattened discs leaves them rustic looking; a thick icing is hard to spread evenly, and also hides the stamped grooves.

For the batch I made for our housewarming party, I made a few changes: only using 30g of dough; really pressing down with the stamps; omitting the zest in the icing, and thinning it out.

We were really pleased with how these turned out. The patterns were really distinct, and my kids particularly liked the citrusy flavour.