Pine Needle Cookies
This cookie is a type of shortbread so if you’ve made shortbread before this will be simple for you. We use this recipe as our base for every herbal cookie we make. The most popular ones we prepare here are the Rose Petal and Orange cookies which Linde keeps in stock for our Bed and Breakfast guests to snack on each day. We’ve also made lavender scented cookies which were equally as delicious in my opinion.
The biggest challenge in this recipe is remembering to prepare the pine-infused butter the day before to make sure it really takes on a pine flavor by letting it infuse overnight. I made the mistake of only allowing it to infuse a few hours the first time I made it and it just didn’t taste as strong.
Once the cookie dough is done we keep ours in plastic wrap in the refrigerator so we can make a fresh batch every day for our guests. I hope you have fun experimenting with different herbs and varying amounts to find your perfect herbal Cookie!
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Pine-Infused Butter
Ingredients
- 1-1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter
- 1/4 to 1/3 cup pine needles coarsely chopped
Instructions
In a double boiler, combine butter and chopped pine needles
- Allow the butter to gently simmer, covered, on low heat for an hour
- Turn off heat and allow the butter to sit overnight
- The next day heat the butter and strain it through a sieve
Recipe Notes
You will need 1 cup butter for the recipe and will lose some of the butter so hopefully you'll have one cup remaining when all is said and done.
Pine Needle Cookies
Pine Needle Cookies
Ingredients
- 2 cups flour
- 1-1/4 tsp salt
- 1 cup pine-infused butter
- 3/4 cup confectioner's sugar
- 2 Tbsp Pine needles finely chopped you can add up to 1/2 cup depending on your taste. Use a blender or coffee grinder to get the pine needles finely chopped
- 4 Tbsp Pine needle sugar for sprinkling on top see recipe below
Pine Needle Sugar
- 2 Tbsp granulated sugar
- 2 tsp chopped pine needles
Instructions
Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.
Cream butter until light and fluffy.
Slowly add sugar and pine needles, scraping down sides.
Mix flour and salt together. Add all at once to the butter/sugar mixture, and mix just until incorporated. Do not over-mix.
Refrigerate dough for 30 min to cool, this will make it easier to work with
At this point you can either use a rolling pin and roll to about 1/2" thick to cut with a cookie cutter or. you can also just roll the dough into small balls and press them flat on the cookie sheet to bake - that's usually what we do.
Bake at 300 degrees F. for about 20-25 minutes, until pale and barely golden. Check at 18-20 minutes.
Remove from oven and sprinkle with pine sugar if desired. Allow to cool on cookie sheet for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to finish cooling.
Store shortbread in an air-tight container for up to 2 weeks.
Pine Needle Sugar
Put 2 Tablespoons sugar in food processor or strong blender (I use a Blendtec) with 2 teaspoons chopped pine needles. Pulse until needles are finely chopped.
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