Vegan Scottish Shortbread Biscuits or Cookies are deliciously sweet and flavoured with vanilla, and are irresistibly crisp, buttery and melt-in-the-mouth. A nice wee pile of these crunchy, crumbly biscuits are a quick bake and are perfect with a nice cup of tea, coffee or a chilled glass of plant-based milk.
115gramsvegan butterroom temperature, or replace with vegan margarine
60gramsicing sugaralso known as powdered or confectioners sugar
1teaspoonvanilla extract
160gramsself-raising flouror use plain or all-purpose flour with 1 teaspoon of baking powder
50gramscornflour[cornstarch]
To sprinkle over the baked biscuits:
2tablespoongranulated sugaror caster sugar, use more as required
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 140 Fan, 160C, 325 Fahrenheit, Gas 3.Line the baking trays with parchment paper.
Add the vegan butter to a mixing bowl and sift in the icing sugar. Either whisk the butter and sugar together by hand with a mixing spoon or use an electric hand whisk until the mixture is thick and creamy.
115 grams vegan butter, 60 grams icing sugar
Next whip through the vanilla until well combined.
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Sift in the flour and cornflour. Mix the flours with a mixing spoon into the creamed mixture until it starts to come together. This may take a few minutes and it may look like the mixture will not come together into a dough but keep mixing.
160 grams self-raising flour, 50 grams cornflour
Using your hands press the bits of straggly looking dough into a ball of dough, pressing the dough between your hands so that it melds together.
Sprinkle flour over the work surface.
Knead very gently as the dough will be rather dry and crumbly.
Dust the rolling pin with flour and dip the biscuit or cookie cutter in some flour. Make sure the work surface is well floured before adding the dough on to it.
Gently but firmly pat the dough down into a flat disc and then use a rolling pin to carefully roll out the dough to about ¼-½ cm thick. If cracks appear on the dough simply smooth these out with your fingers. The dough needs to be rather dry as this is what will give the biscuits their tasty crispness.
Using the cookie cutter stamp out 25-28 biscuits, the exact amount will depend on how thin they are rolled out.
Using a thin spatula or a cutlery knife carefully lift up each cookie and place onto the baking tray. The cookies will not spread so they only need to be a few cm apart.
Bake on the middle shelf for about 20 minutes, or until lightly golden and firm.
The shortbread biscuits will continue to crisp up as they cool.
Sprinkle granulated or caster sugar over the biscuits as soon as they are out of the oven. A little cinnamon can be mixed through the sugar if a cinnamon sugar topping is liked.
2 tablespoon granulated sugar
Leave the shortbread on the tray to cool completely. Although these biscuits are rather nice warm as well.
Notes
Nutritional data is for guidance only and is not an exact calculation as ingredients vary.
Store shortbread biscuits in a biscuit/cookie tin or jar. Or within a covered container. If the container is plastic I recommend lining it with kitchen foil and wrapping the biscuits with the foil to prevent them going soft too soon.
Unbaked biscuit dough can be frozen, well wrapped, for up to 3 months. Defrost before baking.