Home baked shortbread served with tea is a Scottish tradition worth embracing. Why not brew a pot of Earl Grey or Scottish Breakfast tea and serve it piping hot (I love mine with milk and sugar). While you are enjoying your first cup, it’s time to do a bit of baking.
Lizzie’s kitchen-tested recipe for
Scottish Shortbread
Ingredients:
1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar
1/2 cup cornstarch
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup butter, softened
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
Instructions:
Sift confectioners’ sugar, cornstarch, and flour together in a bowl. Add softened butter, using your hands to knead the mixture into dough. Wrap dough in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for no longer than 30 minutes.
Press cold dough into the bottom of a greased 8 x 8 pan (round or square; glass is best).
Bake at 325 for 30 minutes or until the edges are very lightly browned.
Sprinkle granulated sugar across the top. Cool completely, then cut into 8 servings.
P.S. Want to bake a bigger batch? Double the recipe and use a glass oblong baking dish. Want a more festive look? Used colored granulated sugar for the final dusting. (Many thanks to the Hurstbourne Baptist Church Book Clubs for both excellent suggestions!)
Visit my board on Pinterest to enjoy A Victorian visit to Stirling, Scotland, the setting for A Wreath of Snow!
Have you tried baking my shortbread recipe? Read A Wreath of Snow? Visited Scotland? If so, kindly leave a comment below. Holiday blessings to you and yours!
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Enjoyed the Christmas story very much and just finished baking the shortbread and I am awaiting my grand daughters visit in a hour so we can have a special time together. Merry Christmas to you and yours!
Hope you and your grans were happy with how your shortbread turned out, Dawn. Happy Christmas to you as well!
I am just heartsick.I never received this email until 4:55 this afternoon. I wish it had been sent yesterday, I would have loved to have joined in on the festivities!! I am thrilled with the recipe you have posted and will attempt it this weekend. My late Mother was the one who could make a melt-in-your-mouth shortbread in our family. Ohhhh…I missed out on the drawing too!! 🙁 Wishing everyone the merriest of holidays!!!
SO sorry your email didn’t arrive in time, Nancy. I’m afraid Feedburner sends them out on its own mysterious schedule. Here’s the good news: you can watch the whole Livestream anytime you like by clicking on this link: http://www.livestream.com/waterbrookmultnomah/video?clipId=pla_01ac44ee-9c81-4fa9-84e1-ddda7bf42fd4&utm_source=lslibrary&utm_medium=ui-thumb/ Blessings as you bake!
Read “A Wreath of Snow.” Loved it! Surely there’ll be a sequel!!!
So glad you enjoyed my wee novella, Jonna. As for a sequel, that’s something else I have baking in the oven just now. If it happens, you’ll read it here first!
Just finished reading your book and absolutely loved it. Such a refreshing change to read this type of story. I too am hoping for a sequel.
I copied down your recipe for shortbread and am (hopefully) going to make it to take to my sister’s house on Christmas. We both love shortbread.
Shortbread and tea is a thing of beauty! Thanks for reading A Wreath of Snow, Kathy, and for spending a wee bit of time on MyScottishHeart.com.
Hi Liz!
Love your stories, love your blog, love your sharing of all things Scottish!
I can’t wait to share a batch of these cookies and a pot of hot earl grey with my mom, and my daughter, for Christmas! All 3 of us love a spot of tea and warm shortbread to make us feel as if we’re having a celebration on any ordinary day!
Thanks so much for sharing!
Wonderful to know we share a love for Scotland, for her history, for her stories…yes, and for her shortbread. Have a blessed Christmas, Sinita!
Ok, Liz…you were right! The waiting is the hardest! I put my dough in frig to chill, and I’m already checking the clock after licking the dough from the bowl and my fingers, and they’re not even in the oven yet!
Is this the same recipe you had back in your newsletter maybe a year ago? I miss placed it here somewhere and couldn’t find it. That too was WONDERFUL! So anyway, I’m waiting!
Thanks again to everyone who made our trip to Scotland with you so great! Most importantly was that my Mom was able to go too! She (and I) have so much fun listening to you and I already had a love for Scotland, so it was just such a blessing to make this trip together with you! I don’t think there is much travel in Mom’s future as she is beginning to slow down so much. *81 in January) Hard to see it, but again, I just felt like each day together in Scotland was just a bless’n!
Aye, that’s the same recipe I included in my e-newsletter about a year ago, and also published in the final pages of A Wreath of Snow. It’s so simple and never disappoints!
LOVED having you and your mom with us for our Victorian Christmas in Scotland tour. She did a great job of keeping up! It flew by so fast, didn’t it? Each memory is tucked in my heart for safekeeping.
God bless you in 2013 and always!
Dearest Liz,
I was just able to watch your video chat of “A Wreath of Snow” from Lizzie’s kitchen! You are so delightful to listen to and your smile, well, you make my heart bubble with joy! By the way, my precious sister in the Lord, we may be distant relatives on the Welsh side. Wouldn’t that be cool!? We could be doubly related; first by the blood of Christ and then by earthly roots! Okay, you might not be as excited as I am–LOL!
I wasn’t able to watch it live. My daughter had surgery and I was going on little sleep. Thankful that our Lord was right there with her through it all in her road to recovery. And our son-in-law took good care of her. This has been a rough year, but in the same breath of that truth is my gratitude that I have my precious family. My heart goes out to the families of CT.
As I’m writing this and sipping some Chai tea (such a funny name…eww, I forgot to add my sugar! Ha, must remedy that.), I’m making plans to make your yummy sounding shortbread and adding “A Wreath of Snow” to my list of Lizzie books I must get and read!
Merry Christmas & Love to you!
So glad the video was enjoyable to watch, Miriam! I had a ball doing it, of course. And how fun that we may share distant Welsh roots!
I pray your daughter continues to do well. Blessings on you and yours in 2013!
I was fortunate enough to visit Scotland in 1995 and have been trying to get back since. I used to bake shortbread for Hogmanay but haven’t in a few years. I think I’ll try your recipe this year. Thanks for sharing.
Le meas,
Karen
I agree, Karen: it’s the perfect thing to have for Hogmanay, fresh and warm from the oven! This recipe is pretty foolproof. Happy baking and Happy New Year!
My 21 year old son & I are waiting for our dough to chill now! While we were mixing, I was telling him how fantastic you were at Montreat this summer! Wish he could’ve been with us!
What fun we had at Montreat, even in that hot, hot weather! Now that baby, it’s cold outside, time for shortbread. Hope yours tastes delicious, Jessica!
I am making the short bread for New Years Eve! I love your tea cozies! I have been looking for a nice tea pot. I guess I will have to make my own cozies. Good project for the winter.
Aren’t those tea cozies dear? I snapped this photo at a restaurant in Princes Square Mall on Buchanan Street in Glasgow. I thought the wee bottle of milk was charming too. Have a lovely, lively Hogmanay, Mary…and happy baking!
I just finished A Wreath of Snow. Loved it like all your others..
Thank you for describing Scotland and it’s people. I already loved
England and since reading your books now Scotland and Ireland.
Oh, I want to go. Thanks Liz,
Deborah
Thankful that you are a sister in Christ, Liz. I love your bible studies and looking forward to reading your novels. I relish all things Scottish as I’m from the Duncan and Colville clans. I am baking your shortbread now, while wearing my Nova Scotia plaid apron. Blessings to you and yours this Christmas season!
Liz, I just read your novella and loved every page!
My husband and I were blessed to have lived in Aberdeen for eight years in the 80’s-90’s studying at the university and teaching at the American school. We were able to travel and see all of beautiful Scotland during that time. Our daughter was born there, but we moved back when she was only 1 1/2. We took her back for a visit when she was 17, the fulfillment of a promise.
Thank you for all the reminders of customs, foods, sights, and even smells we hold dearly!
God bless! Happy Christmas and Hogmanay to you and yours!
I just finished reading A Wreath of Snow and thoroughly enjoyed it. I look forward to making the shortbread and enjoying more of your books. I found A Wreath of Snow in the book section of my grocery store and am so glad that I did! You have a new fan! Thank you!
Dearest Liz,
I feel as though I’ve just spent time with a treasured friend. Having just finished “My Heart’s in the Lowlands”, I came to your website in search of further inspiration. Your shortbread did it!
I am blessed to travel to Scotland yearly, and this year had already planned to visit Dumfries, the land of my father’s ancestors. I had no set agenda, and went to the bookstore in search of ideas. Needless to say, God’s hand was on my shoulder as I picked up your book. I could feel the mist around my ankles, smell the peat from local farmhouses, and taste the tea. Although I don’t have 10 days to explore the area (on this trip), it is now my top pick for advice on the area.
The Lord has blessed you and in turn, you have shared that blessing with people who will never think of you as a stranger, but always as a dear friend they’ve yet to meet.
Thank you for your evocative words.
Have just baked the shortbread for Christmas – very tasty! We are excited about spending Christmas with our daughter – it will be her first Christmas at eight months old!!
I loved Wreath of snow, and I particularly love both your Scottish series’ of novels. I cried so much reading Fair is the Rose, as I couldn’t imagine the heartache of leaving my daughter!!! My husband was worried about me!
Thanks, and have a blessed Christmas
I just finished four of your books in a week and a half! I could not put them down……
Thorn in My Heart,Grace in Thine Eyes, Fair is the Rose, Whence came a Prince.
I can’t tell you how much I hated to see them end! I am going to search for some of your others, I am not sure were to start! If you ever write more to the ones I have already read I would be so blessed to see them. Thank You so very much! My husbands family are from Glasgow They are McDonald clan ! I love The Lord Jesus and your books have blessed my heart!
Love Sharon
I will be making the shortbread this holiday season.. Your books, your recipe, sets my heart on fire for travel to Scotland. We must answer that call to go home and learn of our past loved ones. I will have to pull your books out and review. I have missed them.
Hi Liz! Scotland was my first (and so far only) international traveling destination in 2013. What a delight to discover my husband’s family is descended from the Burnetts of Crathes Castle.
I made this shortbread at Christmastime so my egg free grandson would have a treat. He liked it. His Grandfather LOVED it!! Making it again today.