St. Patty’s Day Shortbread

St. Patty's Day Shortbread This is a quick and simple shortbread cookie recipe. The cookies bake up firm and crisp, maintaining the shape of whatever your decide to roll into the center of your sweets. To get the colors and shapes inside each of these cookies, I used a simple rolling technique to create a log of cookie dough, then sliced extremely thin cookies off of it. If you've ever made those slice 'n bake polymer clay canes (or millefiori), you will have likely done a similar technique to get a pretty design inside the circle of clay. It takes some time to get the centers just.right, but isn't it worth it?! Just look at those fine little cookie sandwiches. ½ c. Butter ½ c. Sugar ½ c. Light brown sugar 2 c. Flour Pinch of baking soda ¼- ½ c. Water Wilton gel colors In a large bowl, combine butter sugars, flour and soda together with your hands. Add water as needed until dough is pliable, but not too sticky. Separate dough into small balls and knead in various Wilton gel colors. To create designs for the center of each cookie, I simply rolled the dough into small "ropes" then gently layered them together, and rolled them into the center of several white strips of dough. To do this most properly, keep the dough from getting too floury. That's the most important part of this process. Keeping it just moist enough to stick together and working the dough gently. Ever so gentle. Once you've got your "cane" or "log" of dough, place it in the freezer for about 20 minutes. You don't want it too terrible frozen, but you don't want it warm and bloppy, either. Remove the cold log from the freezer and use a very sharp knife to slice off EXTREMELY thin slices. (Approx. 2-3 centimeters thick, if your dough & knife will allow it.) Bake slices on an ungreased cookie sheet, in an oven preheated to 325 degrees for 6-8 minutes. Edges should not be browned, but centers should be cooked through. Remove from heat & allow to cool. Fill cookies with Vanilla-Butter Cookie Crème. * * Vanilla-Butter Cookie Crème Vanilla? Butter? Need I say more?! Whip this up just before you need to fill the centers of your shortbread. Because you are using melted butter to make the crème, the mixture will thicken as it cools. To achieve a nice, smooth edge on my crème, I plopped the freshly-beaten icing into a large Ziploc, then piped it onto each cookie. ½ c. Butter, melted 4 c. Powdered sugar 1 T. Clear vanilla flavoring 1 ½ T. Milk In a large mixing bowl, whip all ingredients together until very smooth. Pipe into the center of cooled shortbread cookies, then smash a second cookie on there to make a delectable, gorgeous cookie sandwich. *