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Home/Cherries/Toasted Almond Black Cherry Shortbread

Toasted Almond Black Cherry Shortbread

It’s hard to imagine a prettier cookie than this one on the holiday cookie platter. It’s almost a bonus that it melts in your mouth, fills your entire olfactory system with the heady aroma of toasted almonds, and just when you think perfection can go no further, adds an uplifting note of black cherry.

Toasted Almond Black Cherry Shortbread | LunaCafeWow, we’re more than halfway through The Twelve Days of Christmas Cookies. What an adventure this has been for the LunaCafe OtherWorldly Kitchen. I always do a ton of baking for the holidays, but this was the first year  I tried to capture in words and photos. (Many many thanks to MauiJim, LunaCafe photo meister, for the beautiful shots.) Plus posting daily, even for only 12 days running, is quite an undertaking.

Hope you are all enjoying the results and perhaps baking along as well. I’m already thinking about what we might do for next year’s extravanganza. For instance, only twelve cookies meant that I had to leave out a lot of my favorites. I wanted to include coconut, cornmeal, more nuts (darn, I didn’t include a hazelnut cookie), fresh herbs, black pepper, and so much more. So that’s the baseline for next year, but for now lets get back to this year’s game plan.

It’s hard to imagine a prettier cookie than this one on the holiday cookie platter. It’s almost a bonus that it melts in your mouth, fills your entire olfactory system with the heady aroma of toasted almonds, and just when you think perfection can go no further, adds an uplifting note of black cherry.

If most cookies have only a middle note (hopefully a very delicious, sustained note) , this cookie has a beginning, a middle, and an end note, each quite wonderful in it’s own way and each complementary to the other two.

In retrospect, I should have probably made these cookies a little smaller as they break my “three bite” Christmas cookie rule. However, it you are serving only one or a couple of  different cookies, this size is just fine. Even so, you won’t eat just one.

Toasted Almond Black Cherry Shortbread

These delicious cookies are very short and tender, and barely sweet. They literally melt in your mouth and the flavor says toasted almonds all the way.

Baking Note   For best results, cookies should be COLD when they go into the oven. Otherwise, they may spread too much. Always give cookies plenty of space to spread regardless, at least an inch between cookies. Baking times are APPROXIMATE. Correct baking times are critical to the success of your cookies. Test your oven and pan setup with a few cookies to start with and watch the timing closely. Dark pans bake faster than light pans or air-sandwiched pans. Silicon mat-lined pans bake faster than parchment-lined pans. Cookies that are rolled to 1/8-inch thick bake faster than cookies rolled to ¼-inch thick. And your oven may be running hot or cold. There are so many variables. Do test a couple of cookies first. It may save an entire batch later.

2 1/2 cups King Arthur unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 cup almond meal (available at Trader Joe’s)
½ teaspoon fine sea salt

1½ cups unsalted butter, cool room temperature (3 cubes)
1 cup superfine sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon almond extract

powdered sugar
black cherry preserves (or other favorite preserves)

  1. In a large mixing bowl, sift the flour and salt. Add the ground almonds Reserve.
  2. In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar.
  3. Add the vanilla and almond extract, and incorporate.
  4. Add the flour mixture and mix on very slow speed very briefly, just until a dough forms.
  5. Divide the dough into 3 equal portions and flatten each portion to a ½-inch thick disk on a sheet of plastic wrap. Seal the plastic wrap around each portion of the dough and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, or overnight. (The sealed dough can be refrigerated for 2-3 days if necessary.)
  6. On a lightly floured pastry cloth, using a covered rolling pin, roll out the dough to 3/16-inch thickness. Use a little flour to keep the dough from sticking if necessary, but try not to work too much additional flour into the dough.
  7. Cut cookies with a round, crinkle-edged cookie cutter.  Using a much smaller round, crinkle-edged cookie cutter, from half of the cookies, cut out the center.
  8. Bake at 375°F for 9-10 minutes, depending on the size of the cookie, rotating pans at the halfway point to ensure even browning.
  9. Remove from the oven, loosen each cookie with a thin spatula and let cool for 3-4 minutes on the pan. Remove cookies from the cookie sheet and place on a wire rack and cool completely.
  10. Put the powdered sugar in a shaker or sieve and sprinkle sugar heavily over the tops of the cutout cookies.
  11. Put the preserves in a glass bowl and microwave for about 30 second, or just until melted. Pour melted preserves through a small sieve into a clean bowl, pushing against the solids to release as much of the strained preserves as possible.
  12. Spread each of the uncut cookies with a thin layer of strained preserves. If the preserves become too thick as you are coating the cookies, warm for several seconds in the microwave.
  13. As you spread the preserves on each uncut cookie, top immediately with a sugar dusted cut out cookie. The preserves must be warm in order to bind the two cookies together.
  14. Store airtight in layers separated by wax paper rounds in a cookie tin in a cool, dry place.

These cookies improve with age. They keep for 3-4 weeks.

Makes 2 dozen, 2¼-inch diameter cookie sandwiches.

THERE’S MORE

Here’s the LunaCafe Twelve Days of Christmas Cookies: Deck the Halls collection. If you bake along, one cookie a day from December 1st to December 12th, you’ll have a wonderful selection of holiday cookies to share with family and friends, with time to spare..

  • On the 1st day of Christmas: Lily’s Swedish Vanilla Spritz   
  • On the 2nd day of Christmas: Orange Vanilla Sugar Cookies 
  • On the 3rd day of Christmas: Decidedly Lemon Teacakes   
  • On the 4th day of Christmas: Once in a Chocolate-Spice Moon Cookies   
  • On the 5th day of Christmas: Peppermint Stick Shortbread   
  • On the 6th day of Christmas: Lemon-Lime Clove Sugar Cookies   
  • On the 7th day of Christmas: Toasted Almond Black Cherry Shortbread   
  • On the 8th day of Christmas: Green Tea & Rose Spritz   
  • On the 9th day of Christmas: Almond Butter Poinsettia Cookies
  • On the 10th day of Christmas: Lemon Orange Pecan Thumbprint Cookies   
  • On the 11th day of Christmas: Candy Cane Butter Cookies   
  • On the 12th day of Christmas: Ellen’s Swedish Pepparkakor  ..

Copyright 2008=2015 Susan S. Bradley. All rights reserved. 

Written by:
Susan S. Bradley
Published on:
December 5, 2015

Categories: Cherries, Christmas Cookies, Cookies, Deck the Halls Cookie Collection, DessertsTags: butter cookies, Christmas, Christmas cookies, cookies, holiday, holiday cookies, LunaCafe cookies, Recipes, toasted almond cookies

About Susan S. Bradley

Intrepid cook, food writer, culinary instructor, creator of the LunaCafe blog, author of Pacific Northwest Palate: Four Seasons of Great Cooking, and former director of the Northwest Culinary Academy.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. plasterer bristol

    February 24, 2016 at 11:30 pm

    These sound delicious, yum. Love cherry and almond. Thanks.

    Simon

  2. Jen

    December 6, 2015 at 8:45 pm

    Black cherry anything is amazing! Love your idea of the 12 cookie days of Christmas too.

  3. Katie

    December 6, 2015 at 7:49 am

    I just love shortbread, and the addition of black cherry makes this even more tempting!

  4. Kathy Hester

    December 5, 2015 at 7:41 pm

    These are gorgeous! I love the black cherry center too.

  5. Bill Volckening

    December 5, 2015 at 6:12 pm

    Those look perfectly delicious! I definitely have to try this recipe. 🙂

  6. Julie

    December 5, 2015 at 6:11 pm

    These look so awesome! I love anything shortbread.

  7. Warren

    December 5, 2015 at 4:39 pm

    Wow, wow, wow! 12 days of cookies is quite the undertaking, but these sound absolutely amazing. Like hearty and sweet. I\\\’m definitely saving this one for later.

  8. Gwen

    December 5, 2015 at 4:36 pm

    I can’t imagine a Holiday cookie platter without these pretty cookies. I love almonds & cherries!

  9. Josie

    December 5, 2015 at 2:45 am

    Cherry and Almond are one of my favorite pairs!! Can’t wait to try these.

    • Susan S. Bradley

      December 5, 2015 at 10:46 am

      Josie, thank you. 🙂

  10. Elizabeth

    December 5, 2015 at 12:32 am

    These are so adorable and I bet that jam just makes them out of this world!

    • Susan S. Bradley

      December 5, 2015 at 10:46 am

      Elizabeth, thank you. Love your cake too. 🙂

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    January 25, 2014 at 7:29 am

    Hey just wanted to give you a quick heads up and let you
    know a few of the pictures aren’t loading properly. I’m not sure why but I think its a linking issue.

    I’ve tried it in two different web browsers and both show the same results.

    • Susan S. Bradley

      January 28, 2014 at 10:21 am

      Thanks for the heads up, much appreciated…

  12. http://raspberrypicomputer.com/raspberry-pi-alternatives.html

    August 3, 2013 at 4:10 pm

    An outstanding share! I’ve just forwarded this onto a colleague who had been doing a little research on this. And he in fact ordered me dinner simply because I found it for him… lol. So allow me to reword this…. Thank YOU for the meal!! But yeah, thanks for spending some time to talk about this subject here on your web site.

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Susan S. Bradley

Intrepid cook, food writer, culinary instructor, creator of the LunaCafe blog, author of Pacific Northwest Palate: Four Seasons of Great Cooking, and former director of the Northwest Culinary Academy. Read More…

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