Dark chocolate orange shortbread sticks

Ingredients

100g Caster sugar

Zest of 2 oranges

160g butter unsalted

1 tsp vanilla paste

260g plain flour

1 /2 tsp salt

40g orange juice

150g dark chocolate

Method

Preheat your oven to 160 degrees or 180 degrees fan forced.

Place the soft butter and orange zest in a bowl and using your fingertips rub the zest into the sugar. This helps release more essential oils from the zest,

Add the softened butter with the vanilla and mix well with a wooden spoon and combine. Do not cream this mixture as it can make the shortbread spread out in the oven.

Add flour, and salt and mix until dough starts to form. Add the orange juice and knead together.

Be careful not to over work this dough

Roll out the cookie dough between two parchment sheets of paper to about 1cm thick and just over 12 cm wide.

Then either place the dough into the freezer for a few minutes or the fridge for 15 to slightly harden the dough.

Once firm, slice your shortbread sticks using a sharp knife. 12cm long, 1cm wide, 1cm high.

Re roll any scraps you have and you should get 36 in total.

Carefully transfer the cookie sticks onto a baking tray and bake the cookies for about 15-18 minutes or until golden brown.

Allow sticks to cool

Once sticks are cooled, melt your chocolate in the microwave at 30 second bursts. Once melted dunk the shortbread ends into the chocolate, gently shaking to remove excess chocolate and place onto a baking tray.

For extra decoration transfer any remaining chocolate into a piping bag and use it to create zig zag lines over the chocolate dipped ends.

Sprinkle with some cracked sea salt

Allow the chocolate to set.

Eat and enjoy.

with love

x

loopy whisks orange shortbread cookie sticks

I tweaked this recipe as I couldn’t find any xantham gum so decided to make them wheat based, omitting the corn flour and xantham gum and adding 30% more fat content than her original recipe, they came out perfect.

Always mix your zest into your sugar to create a stronger flavour. This process helps release the oils of the zest, tint the colour of the sugar and infuse the tang of the citrus into the sugar.