Tea Shortbread Trio

Recently, I've been getting really into drinking tea and wanted to make a trio of tea shortbreads to really highlight the flavors.

I created all these cookies from three different tea infused doughs. There's earl grey, matcha and chocolate chai. The matcha and cocoa makes the latter two flavors much less sweet, so I dipped some of the cookies in chocolate and royal icing to balance out the bitterness. These cookies are simple to make, especially if you have a 4-cup food processor. Simply put in all the dry ingredient (including whole tea leaves!) and blend until the tea is evenly chopped and distributed throughout the mix. Add in the wet ingredients, blend one more time and the dough is done.

These doughs will all be fairly soft, so they'll need to be refrigerated for at least an hour before they can be shaped and cooked. I decided to make a rectangular log with dimensions of 1 x 2 x 8 inches. This way you can make small individual shortbreads and you can stack them to create fun patterns like stripes and checkerboard. You can also create a teabag-shaped cookie by stacking the three doughs and cutting off the corners of the top dough.

If you want to put a tea string on it, I'd recommend cutting a whole before you bake the cookie. I used a straw to take out a small circle of dough. After the cookie bakes, make sure the hole is still open, if it's not, use a toothpick to open the hole.

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Recipe

Makes: 60 cookies (20 of each)

Ingredients

Earl Grey Shortbread:

• 1 cup all-purpose flour

• 1/2 cup confectioners' sugar

• 1 tablespoon Earl Grey tea leaves (empty from a teabag)

• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened at room temperature

Matcha Shortbread:

• 1 cup all-purpose flour

• 1/3 cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted

• 2 tablespoons matcha green tea powder

• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened at room temperature

Chocolate Chai Shortbread:

• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour

• 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted

• 1/3 cup Dutch-process cocoa powder

• 1 tablespoon masala chai black tea leaves, finely ground

• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened at room temperature

Directions

1. Mix together sugar, flour, tea, salt, and cocoa powder (if needed) in a 4 cup food processor. Grind until the tea leaves become small granules.

2. Add in the butter and mix until dough is combined and can come together. Form it into a log and place in plastic wrap. Refrigerate until firm, at least 1 hour.

3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 for the other two recipes.

4. Preheat oven to 375F. Take the cooled dough and reshape the log from a circle into a rectangle. My final shape ended up being 1 inch by 2 inches by 8 inches.

5. Slice the dough into 1/3 inch pieces. If the dough doesn't hold its shape place it back in the fridge for 30-60 minutes.

6. Place cookies on a baking sheet and cook for 18 minutes. Let cool 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.

Recipes inspired from Faith's recipe "Earl Grey Tea Cookies" and Arbor Tea's "Tea Laced Shortbread Trio" recipe.