I grew up with Scottish Shortbread. My grandmother taught me how to make it with
her own recipe. It was definitely much
plainer than this one and probably a lot simpler. No need to freeze and grate dough! Julia’s recipe, found on page 327 of her book
Baking with Julia, is very
different. It starts out pretty straight
forward. If you like buttery cookies,
this one is for you! I made the dough Sunday
afternoon and froze it overnight.
I had to compromise on the rhubarb jam as it is not quite in
season. Most likely in the next week or so, we will start to see it in the
grocery stores. I did find a jar of
strawberry rhubarb preserves without any sugar that worked just fine. I also made one other substitution. Two cups of sugar on top of a pound of butter
was just too hard to take. I usually
have some sugar/stevia blend on hand so I used one cup of regular sugar and ½ cup
of the blend. I must say it tastes wonderful
and no one noticed.
Last night, I took
out one of the logs from the freezer. I
shaped each on into a log thinking it would be easier to grate. I’m glad I did.
Wow, what a chore! I’m not used to
grating something this hard or this long.
If I make this again, I will have to think about how I can make
technology work for me. There has to be
a better way! With all the kitchen
machines at our disposal, I bet I can make one work for this recipe.
I must say the shortbread came out of the oven looking
great. I baked it according to the
recipe although many others baked the bottom layer for 15 minutes before adding
the jam and top layer. I had no issues
although the bottom layer was a little more chewy and soft. I even had one colleague at work comment on
the difference thinking it was two entirely different layers!
Considering the amount of butter, I took about 2/3 ‘s of
this scrumptious cookie/dessert??? to work.
There is no way my husband and I can eat all this. We may both have a coronary with all the
saturated fat! I asked for feedback and everyone was really impressed and loved
the taste.
“ Awesome” and “Sinful” were too comments I received! I think that about sums it up!
Head on over to our hosts blogs for the recipe.
Happy baking!
