Kourabiethes

Mmmm, yum!  Kourabiethes (Greek shortbread) are one of my absolute favourite biscuits to bake.  I love all sorts of shortbread, but these little darlings are perfectly to my taste. After making a batch this evening, I thought I'd share the recipe so that you can share in this melt-in-your-mouth delight!

Kourabiethes
(I make between 40 and 50 biscuits with this recipe)

Ingredients
250g butter
2 x cups pure icing sugar - 1 for the mixture and 1 for dusting afterwards - you need to sift it
2 tsp vanilla essence
Orange zest (grated rind) from one orange
1 x egg
2 1/2 cups plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup almond meal

Before I tell you how to put these together, let me just say one thing: Working with pure icing sugar can be frustrating because it is hard to sift.  Sifting the sugar is the one thing that stops me making these all the time. LOL.  You CAN'T not sift it though, it's a bit like chunks of sweet rock before sifting sometimes.

Method

• Beat butter, 1 cup sifted sugar, vanilla, and orange zest together until light.
• Beat egg into butter mixture.
• Sift flour and baking powder and add to mixture with almond meal.
• Mix everything together until the mixture is combined (it might still look crumbly, but the mixture will stick together when you roll it into balls).
• Take spoonfuls of mixture and make logs/snakes about 7cm long.  I find that making the logs from a ball of dough is easiest.
• Curve the log into a crescent and place on baking tray.
• Bake at about 160 degrees for about 15 - 20 minutes (until starting to turn slightly golden).
• Place the other cup of sifted icing sugar in a bowl and coat the biscuits while they are still warm.  I always find I have some sugar left over in this bowl, so I just throw it over the biscuits in their container - it makes them pretty when you take them out later for serving (you might need to shake off some excess sugar!)

If you give this recipe a go, I hope you like it. :-)

Michelle