By Amanda Biddle
This recipe combines two of my favorite winter treats: shortbread cookies and Chai tea lattes. These buttery cookies, speckled with black tea leaves and classic Chai spices, are perfect for warming up on a cold day. Finished with a creamy white chocolate drizzle, they also make a beautiful addition to holiday cookie trays.
Yield: 2 dozen cookies
Ingredients
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons finely-ground black tea leaves
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly-ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
pinch ground cloves
3/4 cup (1-1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar, plus additional for sprinkling cookies
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 ounces white chocolate, melted
Preparation
1. Whisk together flour, tea, salt, and spices. Set aside.
2. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and 1/2 cup sugar until light and fluffy. Mix in the vanilla. Add the flour mixture in 3 additions, mixing on medium-low speed until just combined. Scrape the bowl between additions.
3. Turn dough out onto a lightly-floured surface and shape into a rectangle about 1-inch thick. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.
4. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F and line a baking sheet with parchment.
5. Roll chilled dough between two pieces of waxed paper into a 9×10-inch rectangle (about 1/4-inch thick). Cut into 24 rectangular pieces.
6. Transfer dough to baking sheet, spacing them about 1 inch apart. Sprinkle the top of each cookie with granulated sugar.
7. Bake 15-20 minutes, until the edges of the cookies are light golden brown. Cool cookies completely on a wire rack.
8. Place cooled cookies on a piece of parchment and drizzle the tops with melted white chocolate. Let the chocolate set at room temperature for about 10 minutes.
9. Store cookies in an airtight container for up to 5 days.
About Amanda:
Food Writer, Recipe Developer, and Photographer
Amanda Biddle is a New Jersey-based food writer and photographer who believes that
there are few bad days that can’t be improved with a warm baguette and a wedge of
Brie. She shares her love of food and wine on her website, Striped Spatula, which
celebrates the beauty of fresh ingredients in gourmet home cooking. Find her on the Web at stripedspatula.com or across social media @stripedspatula.
About the Author/s
The New Jersey Digest is a new jersey magazine that has chronicled daily life in the Garden State for over 10 years.
