
Some things in life are meant to be simple. And these vegan-buttery shortbread cookies are one of them.
It started with my wanting to make some basic cookies for my egg, dairy and peanut-allergic toddler for snack time. It took about a dozen attempts to finally get the taste and mouthfeel worthy of comparison to my traditional benchmark, M&S shortbread cookies. M&S shortbread was a staple of my childhood so to be able to give Corey a similar cookie experience without his allergens of eggs, dairy and peanut is a decent achievement.
These are no spread cookies so they hold their shape decently well during the baking process. This makes for a fun kiddy activity on the weekends for the whole family.
Switch off the tv this weekend and start baking with your kids!
A cookie making session never fails to draw my boys away from the tv. They also get a small lesson in delayed gratification while waiting for the cookies to bake and cool down. Although my heart does skip a beat or two when they shove each other around to try and peer into the oven wanting to watch the cookies bake…
Simple ingredients but pay attention to the method for dough consistency
I used my stand and hand mixers in my first few attempts at this dough and found that my vegan butter melted faster than I could say ve-gan-but-ter. So the trick to this dough is to do everything USING FORKS & SPOONS BY HAND. A bit of a workout but a worthy one as you will be rewarded with a crumbly, buttery cookie. Too much flour and too much mixing will result in a tough cookie.
I love NUTTELEX
This stuff tastes BETTER than traditional butter. It’s from Australia and has a few flavours. I like the original which is made with sunflower oil. It can be found in most NTUC Finest and Cold Storage supermarkets, along with speciality supermarkets and also Redmart.com
Nuttelex has a coconut flavour version but I avoid using that because of a few close friends whose children have a coconut allergy.
DID YOU KNOW: Coconut allergy is getting more common in South East Asia. Why? Similar to how Japan has high buckwheat allergy numbers because of their consumption of buckwheat. Coconut is a common cooking ingredient in South East Asia which has somehow induced allergy in children. Go figure.
Decorate to your heart’s content!
This basic cookie goes well with tea and coffee on its own. But if you’re feeling creative like us, you can decorate them with royal icing or fondant for a bit of holiday cheer.
R’s requested for a POKEMON 6th birthday so the kids got busy making some Pokeballs and Pokemon. I made the rest and we spent a fun afternoon crafting these yummy treats.
So here’s the recipe, just remember the ingredients are simple but PAY CLOSE ATTENTION to the method to get your perfect cookie.
The ingredients are simple so you can make small variations based on your taste and cookie purposes. For cookies you intend to decorate with fondant or royal icing, I usually cut the sugar content in this recipe by 30%. For those who prefer an even more delicate crumbly cookie, you can substitute the plain flour with cake flour or add a bit of cornflour. This is an incredibly soft dough so I would work fast otherwise the butter would melt.
Ingredients
Instructions
Notes
2 comments
This blog article is very helpful
Thanks!! Do share photos of your cookie creations and also follow me on IG @amandaprosimple ?