Bay Leaf & Lemon
Shortbread
Share this Recipe
The leaves of the bay laurel tree are a lot more versatile than many of us realize, and they contribute a fantastic, distinctive flavour to sweet recipes, as well as savoury. These bay leaf and lemon shortbread cookies incorporate finely ground bay in the dough and the sweet-yet-tart lemony icing. The results are unique, delightfully delicious, and sure to stand out proudly from Christmas cookie pack.
My childhood Christmases always matched up pretty nicely with the kinds of Christmases you see in books and movies. It was cold and snowy, presents under the tree, family get togethers, seasonal cookies and other treats... the whole shebang. Heck, we even had the occasional once-a-year trip to church, like the good extremely-lapsed Catholics we were. I don't remember thinking much about Christmas being different for other people - and why would I? I was a kid in a predominantly white and Christian part of the world. I had two weeks off of school, a pile of presents to eyeball, way too many cookies, and storybook (i.e. beautifully snowy, yet miserably cold) weather.
As the late Glenn Campbell sang - Christmas is for children. Your childhood version of the holiday (if you celebrated it of course) is probably still near and dear to you in your adulthood, regardless of how much it may or may not have resembled my own. But as we grow up and confront the realities of adulthood, our expectations of Christmas tend to change. A lot.
Don't get me wrong - I still love this time of the year. But it doesn't take long to figure out that a Christmas for children needs to be organized by adults. On top of this, life has a delightful way of tossing obstacles at you with zero regard for the date on the calendar. Sure, sometimes you get to fill the house with the delightful aroma of Christmas cookies. But sometimes you also have to fill the house with the less-than-festive aroma of trapped scummy water pouring out of the washing machine you dismantled to repair the seized pump motor. Fa la la la la.
Honestly, I don't mean to sound grumpy about the whole thing. I'm very grateful to be where I am, living the life I'm living. I'm also very lucky to get to watch my three kids enjoying their own care-free lives during this time of the year. But given that our expectations for the holidays tend to be changed on us whether we like it or not, it seems fitting - to me anyway - to introduce a little bit of the unexpected on our own terms. I do this with cookies. Specifically, I do it by trying to figure out exactly what I can do with (or perhaps to) a cookie to make it decidedly different. Delicious, of course - I'm not a masochist. But definitely different.
This year, it's bay leaves.
Bay leaves! It might sound a bit bizarre, but frankly, bay leaves absolutely deserve wider recognition in the spice pantheon. I'll get into why this is below, but for now, let's talk about bay leaf and lemon shortbread. They're buttery cookies, of course. I make shortbread every year precisely because it's such a delightfully simple, buttery, not-too-sweet kind of treat. The lemon zest perks up the dough, and the bay adds a very slight spice profile to the cookies themselves. On their own, the cookies are fairly simple, and not all-that-far-off from a standard shortbread recipe. But the icing! Oh, the icing. The icing takes the cookie flavours and kicks them into overdrive. The pronounced tanginess of the lemon is the first thing you notice, and it nicely balances the sweetness of the royal icing. Right after the lemon, you get the bay, and it's enchanting. Your brain feels like it knows what it's tasting, but you can't quite figure it out. Moments later, the smooth, rich flavour of the shortbread comes in, and everything kind of merges into cookie perfection.
Tis the season to share shortbread, so I figured I'd gather some opinions on these unique cookies from friends and family. So, what was the verdict? The icing, in all its spice-and-lemon glory, is definitely a defining feature. It's hard to pack a whole lot of flavour into the shortbread itself, but the subtle bay and lemon notes there are fantastically complimented by the tangy and sweet royal icing. I'm not generally a huge fan of overly sweet cookies, and I found that the brightness of the lemon and the richness of the butter really cut through the sugar. But don't just trust me! I had these cookies taste-tested by the most important of Christmas cookie critics - my kids! Here's the synopsis:
- Diversivore Kids (ages 9, 6, and 2.5) - The tanginess won the day. Everyone really liked the sweet/tart lemon combination, and the bay leaves were appreciated widely. The youngest summed it up best with a long, drawn out "Mmmm!" of approval.
But hey, I could have paid them off right? Like... with more cookies. So I took it a step further and had them taste-tested by my friends' kids too! Here are THOSE reviews!
- FOD (Friend of Diversivore) Kids (5 in total, ages 6-9) - These kids didn't know the identity of the secret ingredient (and neither did their parents, because I like to take a mad scientist approach to this stuff). The lemon was a hit once again, as was the shortbread base itself. The bay leaf threw them for a loop at first, but everyone came around very quickly. My favourite comment was from the kid who went from liking it "medium" to liking it "a lot" as she progressed through the cookie. Honestly, I think that kind of sums it up nicely - it's a decidedly different kind of cookie, so it takes a second to sort of wrap your head around it. But then it clicks, and everything just makes delicious sense.
None of the adults guessed that the cookies contained bay leaves, much to my delight (again: mad scientist). What was particularly interesting was the impression that the mystery spice gave to my dedicated crew of cookie consumers. Pepper, cardamom, and rosemary were all guessed, and one of my friends said it reminded her of Indian sweets. Ultimately, everyone was delighted by the reveal (or very good at lying to me), and there was considerably fascination over the potential that bay leaves held for future culinary adventures. If you've got foodie friends and you want to watch them go crazy trying to puzzle something out, I strongly encourage you to gift a batch of these.
Recipe Notes
As is the case with most shortbread, there's nothing overly complicated going on with the actual making and baking of these cookies. It is, however, worth being aware of a couple of pieces of equipment that will make the process much easier, and a few modifications that you can make if you're so inclined. I'm also going to touch on what kind of bay leaf to use, because yes, there are in fact multiple kinds of bay leaf out there in the world!
The "What & Why" of Bay Leaves
The leaves of the bay laurel tree are incredibly popular in cooking, and yet, I feel, somewhat underutilized. They also seem to be somewhat poorly understood - or even recognized, given that there's a meme-load of irate tweets from Chipotle customers complaining about the leaves in their burritos. So let's start with some facts.
The bay laurel (Laurus nobilis) is an ornamental and culinary evergreen shrub/tree native to the Mediterranean region. Interestingly, much of the Mediterranean was once covered in dense and humid forests of laurel (of various species), but the region began to dry out a few million years ago, causing the laurels to retract into patches and pockets in various countries. Bay laurel leaves are highly aromatic, and have long been used to add flavour to a variety of recipes. They figure prominently in Italian cooking (e.g. pasta sauces), and in various stews and slow-cooked dishes.
But the bay leaf is not inherently limited to savoury preparations; it's got a beautiful, resinous, aroma that works in all kinds of places. The leaves have a lot of eugenol in them, which is a compound found in (amongst other things) cloves, cinnamon, basil, and nutmeg. As you can see, that list already includes a bunch of spices that comfortably reside on both sides of the sweet-vs-savoury question.
Now, it's important to note that there are a couple of different things out there in the world that fall under the moniker of 'bay leaf' and they're not all interchangeable. This recipe uses dried bay laurel leaves, which are what you'll generally find labeled as bay leaves in Western grocery stores. Fresh bay leaves are NOT interchangeable with dried bay leaves for three very important reasons. First, the intensity of flavour isn't the same. Second, the resin and moisture in the fresh leaves makes them harder to grind. Third, and perhaps most importantly, they're often not even the same kind of bay leaves. In North America, the fresh bay leaves found in stores often come from California bay laurel (aka Oregon myrtle - Umbellularia californica). California bay has a flavour that's similar to bay laurel, but quite a bit stronger, and often a little more intensely eucalyptus-like. If you dry your own bay leaves, be aware that California bay will retain this same potency and flavour profile even in this form.
There is another type of bay leaf to be aware of too, and it's altogether different. The Indian bay leaf (Cinnamomum tamala) is, unsurprisingly, commonly found in Indian grocery stores. It is sometimes just labeled as 'bay leaf' (at least where I live), so it's worth being aware of the difference. Indian bay has a pronounced cinnamon flavour, though this is much milder than cinnamon itself. Indian bay leaves have three central 'ribs' that run parallel to each other, while true bay laurel has just a single central rib.
The "How" of Bay Leaves
Alright, let's talk about how to use these lovely, unexpected leaves.
Bay leaves are frequently used in simmered and slow-cooked dishes and removed before serving. This is because because the rigid, tough structure that makes the leaves unpleasant in a mouthful of food also makes them able to stand up to long cooking times. This means that bay leaves are unpleasantly tough, but this is hardly a unique problem when it comes to spices. After all, nobody in their right mind is trying to make an apple pie with chunks of literal cinnamon bark. It's bark. We're going to tackle the issue by completely pulverizing the leaves with a spice grinder. This has the added benefit of making it a lot easier to really get a sense for the distinctive aroma of the bay leaf, which will (I hope) further convince you that this is in fact a good idea.
If you don't have a spice grinder (or clean coffee grinder), you still have a couple of options. First, you can blitz the leaves with sugar in a high speed blender or food processor. If that's not an option either, you can manually pulverize the leaves with a mortar and pestle, though it's probably going to be a fair bit of work. In all cases, you'll probably want to sift the ground bay leaves to eliminate any particularly large bits that escaped crushing.
If grinding bay isn't manageable, you can modify the recipe by making a simple syrup with lemon juice, water, and sugar, then simmering 2 bay leaves in this. When cooled, this syrup can be used to make the royal icing. You'll have to do a bit of calculating to get your quantities and ratios right, but it's a viable option.
Easy Royal Icing
Royal icing is traditionally made with egg whites, but this presents a couple of challenges. Raw egg whites aren't something that everyone is comfortable using, and pasteurized egg whites aren't necessarily the easiest thing to find. Normally I prefer to work with the simplest and least processed ingredients that I can, but when it comes to royal icing, I really like to use meringue powder instead of egg whites.
Meringue powder is shelf-stable, fully cooked egg-based product that can be used to replace egg whites in various recipes. When it comes to traditional meringue desserts, I very much prefer to use egg whites, but royal icing becomes easier to make and (perhaps more importantly) more easily flavoured when you use meringue powder. The easy-to-make part is pretty self-explanatory; no raw egg whites, no separating eggs, just mixing ingredients and you're done. As for the flavouring aspect, it has to do with the fact that meringue powder requires the addition of liquid to make up for the missing water in the egg whites. You can just use water, but substituting something like lemon juice (as is the case for this recipe) provides a big hit of flavour that's otherwise difficult to inject into traditional royal icing.
If you prefer to make royal icing with egg whites you still can, though you might find it tricky to get as much lemon flavour in. I've got a few suggestions in the recipe card below.
Shaping & Sizing the Cookies
Shortbread is a pretty versatile dough when it comes to shaping the cookies. I wanted very consistent shapes and sizes, so I measured out 25 g balls, which were then pressed into a circular cookie cutter and laid out on silicone baking sheets. If that's a bit extreme for you, you can simply scoop out spoonfuls of dough and flatten them out. I personally don't like rolling out shortbread, but if you're willing to let the dough warm up a bit, you can roll it out to a desired thickness and use a cookie cutter.
If you have a shortbread pan, check out the post I did last year on grapefruit-rosemary shortbread for instructions on how to adapt a basic recipe like this one to work in a ceramic pan. The icing aspect will have to be handled differently, but carefully piped royal icing on the decorative lines made by a shortbread pan would look pretty stunning.
Batch Size & Leftovers
The shortbread dough itself is easily scaled up or down depending on how much you want to make, but the icing is a little trickier. If you're using a stand mixer, it can be hard to make a batch of royal icing much smaller than the one given in the recipe card, and even this is likely to produce more than you need. It's a little easier if you're using a hand mixer and a small bowl, but still, the quantities aren't particularly large. Fortunately, extra icing freezes very nicely! If you've got more than you can use, put it into a small resealable bag, then lay this flat in the freezer. It will keep for 6 months or more this way.
If you want to make a lot of cookies (and who could blame you), they also freeze quite nicely, with or without icing. If you're planning to make batches to give to family and friends, you can make them at your leisure and freeze batches to give away whenever you're ready. They'll keep for at least a month, most likely longer. Unless your family raids them all while you're distracted, that is.
Note: Nutritional Information is given for a single iced cookie (1/48th portion of the total recipe).
Nutritional Summary
Ingredient Pages
No ingredient pages have been written yet for any of the ingredients in this recipe. Like to see one? Let me know in the comments below or by email.
Pantry Pages
No pantry pages have been written yet for any of the ingredients in this recipe. Like to see one? Let me know in the comments below or by email.
Bay Leaf & Lemon Shortbread
Equipment
- Spice (or Coffee) Grinder
- Stand or hand mixer
Ingredients
Cookies
- 3 small dry bay leaves
- 1 cup sugar
- 2 cups butter at room temperature
- 1 tsp lemon zest
- 1/8 tsp salt
- 4 cups flour
Icing
- 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 5 small bay leaves
- 1 cup icing sugar
- 1 tbsp meringue powder (see note)
- 3 tbsp lemon juice
Instructions
Shortbread
- Position a rack in the center of your oven, and preheat to 350°F (175°C).
- Combine the bay leaves with 1-2 tablespoons of the sugar in a spice grinder. Grind until the bay leaves have been reduced to powder (sift out any stubborn bits). Set aside.
- Using a stand mixer or hand mixer, thoroughly combine the butter, bay/sugar mixture, remaining sugar, lemon zest, and salt.
- Add flour to the butter mixture a little at a time, mixing until a malleable dough is formed. It should have a consistency rather like playdough.
- Shape the cookies into rounds. I use 25 g portions (roughly a heaping tablespoon), pressed into cookie cutters for consistency, but you can use any method of shaping that works for you.
- Bake for 18-20 minutes for larger (25 g) cookies (less for smaller cookies) or until lightly browned at the edges.
Icing
- Combine the granulated sugar and bay leaves in a spice grinder. Grind until the bay leaves have been reduced to powder (sift out any stubborn bits). Set aside.
- Using a stand mixer or hand mixer (whisk and paddle attachments both work fine), thoroughly combine the bay/sugar mixture with the remaining icing ingredients. Combine at medium speed until the mixture forms a thick, even, icing. (See note below)
- Dip the cooled cookies in the icing and let the excess drip off. Alternatively, you can pipe the icing on if you prefer. Lay the finished cookies out on racks to dry for 12-24 hours. Drying times can depend on the humidity of your home and the thickness of the icing. I personally prefer that the icing ends up solid, but not rock hard, which means a somewhat shorter drying time.
Comments
Why have I never thought to use bay leaves in sweet foods before? This is brilliant!
I LOVE shortbread with herbs in it…rosemary, thyme and I never even thought of bay leaf. I’ve only just started finding fresh bay leaves locally.
I’m jealous of your willing army of cookie tasters, now that we’re empty nesters I need a new strategy before the two of us balloon.
I have a little bay tree that lives inside during winter, and has given me a lifetime supply of bay leaves. You have really inspired me here with these amazing cookies to think outside the box in ways to use them.
really great flavour combination Sean!! somehow it just works with the lemon and bay leaves!
I LOVE This adventurous cookie. I have only ever used bay leaves in soup and stew type dishes and never thought to try it in a sweet cookies. It’s wonderful to see such creativity.