Sometimes you just need a simple, small batch recipe for the holiday season. And while classics like snowball cookies are yummy, sometimes you want to make a unique recipe like these orange shortbread cookies with ginger.
Simple, tasty, and pretty, they’re pretty much the perfect cookie for the holiday season.
Classic simple shortbread cookies are always in season. But when the holidays come around, a little bit of pizzazz is in order.
With a touch of zing from candied ginger, and a light, bright citrus flavor from a bit of orange zest, these simple cookies have just enough pizzazz for your holiday cookie platter.
What You’ll Need:
Supplies:
- Stand mixer with paddle attachment
- Bowl for stand mixer
- measuring cups and spoons
- parchment paper
- rolling pin
- cookie cutters
- small bowl
Ingredients:
- powdered sugar
- crystallized ginger
- unsalted butter, cut into cubes
- orange zest
- all purpose flour
- egg yolks
- sparkling sugar (or granulated sugar)
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Some of the best things about these cookies: they have just the right amount of crumble, and the candied ginger pieces give you little flavorful bits in each bite.
My favorite thing is that they hardly spread at all in the oven, which makes them perfect for cutting with cookie cutters.
Tips for Making Orange Shortbread Cookies with Ginger
Grind up your candied ginger
Pulsing the candied ginger in a small food processor or blender means that the pieces are better distributed throughout the cookie dough.
I used the smoothie cup from my Ninja blender set, but if you only have a knife, just do your best to chop the pieces up to about the size of a grain of rice.
Roll your dough between two sheets of parchment paper
This is a trick I learned years ago, and it’s one of my favorites. Instead of rolling your dough out on a floured surface, simply place it between two sheets of parchment paper.
This way you don’t accidentally make your cookies tough from the extra flour, and it’s a lot easier to clean up too.
Don’t Skip Refrigeration
Chilling the dough serves a few purposes:
- it allows the flavors to come together,
- it makes the dough firm enough to cut easily, and
- also helps to reduce any spreading (so you keep that pretty cookie cutter shape)
Splurge on the Sparkling Sugar
You can use regular granulated sugar to coat these cookies, but large bakery-style sparkling sugar just makes them so much prettier.
I got mine from the sprinkles section at my local grocery store, so they’re not hard to get.
How to Make Orange Shortbread Cookies with Ginger
A printable recipe card is below, but here’s a quick step-by-step collage to show all the steps:
More Holiday Desserts to Love
- Holiday Truffles with a Boozy Twist
- Orange Vanilla Candied Cranberries
- Easy Candied Pecans
- Cranberry Bars with a Pistachio Shortbread Crust
- Soft and Chewy Almond Macaroons
Orange Shortbread Cookies with Ginger
Orange shortbread cookies with ginger are buttery, crisp, and melt in your mouth delicious with fresh citrus flavor and a zing from crystallized ginger.
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup powdered sugar
- 1/4 cup crystallized ginger
- 9 1/2 Tbsp unsalted butter, cut into cubes
- 2 tsp orange zest
- 1 3/4 cup plain all-purpose flour
- 3 large egg yolks
- 1/4 cup granulated or sparkling sugar, for coating
Instructions
Prepare Ingredients
- Cut your butter into tablespoon sized pieces and allow to soften for 20 minutes.
- Place 1/4 cup of crystallized ginger in a food processor and pulse for a few seconds to pulverize.
- Prepare a small bowl with 1/4 cup of granulated or sparkling sugar.
Prepare the Dough
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the pulverized ginger and powdered sugar with a whisk.
- Add the softened butter and orange zest to the powdered sugar mixture and cream together the using the paddle attachment of a stand mixer.
- Add the flour one or two tablespoons at a time and mix until well combined.
- Mix in the egg yolks one at a time on low speed.
- Continue mixing until well fully incorporated and the dough sticks together during mixing.
- Remove the dough from the bowl and form into a thick disk.
- Roll the dough between sheets of parchment paper until about 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch thick.
- Keep the dough between the sheets of parchment paper, chill in the refrigerator until firm (or freeze for later use), about 30-45 minutes.
- Use a cookie cutter to cut dough into desired shapes.
- Carefully coat the cookie dough in sparkling sugar.
- Cut into desired shapes and coat with sugar.
- Bake cookies for 10 t0 15 minutes (depending on thickness) until just barely golden at the edges.
- Cool on a rack for 10 minutes
Bake the cookies
- Preheat an oven to 350 degrees F and prepare a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- Remove cookie dough from refrigerator and use a cookie cutter to cut dough into desired shapes.
- Carefully coat the cookie dough in sparkling sugar.
- Bake cookies for 10 to 15 minutes (depending on thickness) until just barely golden at the edges.
- Cool on the pan for 5 minutes before removing to a rack. Cool completely before serving.
Nutrition Information:
Serving Size:
1 gramsAmount Per Serving: Unsaturated Fat: 0g
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