My Grandma's Shortbread
My Grandma gifted me all her handwritten recipes and I’m just making my way through them all. Here’s photographs of her orginal copies of her shortbread recipes (she has about 5 copies of the same recipe). Funny story - my Mutti has a typed version of ‘Alison’s Shortbread’ and it’s the same recipe.
The OG buttery biscuits from ye old childhood.
These biscuits sat in my Grandma’s kitchen in a jar and they would roll out every time we visited her without fail. She never not had a jar of these. For once I’m not referring to Mutti for once this is the other one, my dad’s mum - Ms Alison Spring.
Her biscuits were round and perfectly white, always perfectly baked and always supremely buttery. In the pictures you can see I have made them into little pride flags for work. I can imagine my not-so-progressive, CWA grandma not loving that but I think in her older age she would appreciate it. I do tell her I’m still unmarried and the only grandchild she will get from me is of the fur baby kind (and maybe I’ll have two soon). She grew to accept my Yuki bear. But I’ll always remember she still had photos of me and my ex in her living room for years after that was not a thing anymore. I wonder if she put them up in her new room.
My grandma turns 90 on the 3 January 2026, you wouldn’t know it though she looks fantastic for her age. My sister calls her ‘groovy granny’, she’s always had style and cared about her looks. So in memory of my Grandma’s pending 9 decades on this earth I give you her gift to me.
Makes a log that you slice into 24-30 cookies depending on the thickness
The Cookies
200 g softened butter (I use salted butter, room temperature but not like QLD hot day room temperature becuase then you will have liquid)
115 g icing sugar
250 - 300 g plain flour (if it’s too wet then add the extra, I usually add around 275 g)
pinch of salt (I added this)
1 tsp vanilla bean paste (I added this)
To make the biscuits
Place butter in bowl and mix until whipped and pale. Add the sugar, mix on low to combine then increase speed and beat until. white.
Sift flour into mix, sprinkle salt and add vanilla. Mix until just comined.
Place dough on bench and sprinkle flour so it does not stick. Divide into two portions. Roll into logs about 24-30 cm long. Place in wrap and in the fridge for half an hour to 90 minutes - until firm.
Preheat oven to 160-170’C (the lower temperature if fan forced). Prepare baking trays with baking paper.
Using pastry scraper/knife cut logs into 1.5-2cm thick disks. If the dough has become soft again, place in fridge or freezer to firm up.
Place on prepared trays. Bake for 20 minutes, until just golden around the edges.
Notes:
*You can separate the dough into lots of portions add food colouring then using a rolling pin roll into flat long rectangles, stack all the coloured rectangles on top of each other so you have a 5-7 cm tall, 10-12 cm wide and 30 cm long rectangular log. Place in fridge to firm up then slice. This is how you make the colourful log. Inspiration from lani bakes.
final thoughts…
Ice hockey is keeping me sane while the AFL is in off-season. Let’s go RANGERS!!!!!!
Amelia xx
