Today the Light and Tasty column is dedicated to coffee. ☕😊 For the occasion, I made some coffee cookies, simple, with a coffee shortcrust pastry that I made by slightly modifying my classic shortcrust recipe, where I replaced the egg with coffee, nothing more.

In the past, I tried making them using instant coffee – adding it to the shortcrust pastry as an extra ingredient – but I have no photos of that experiment and can’t remember if the cookies turned out well. However, since instant coffee has never been a big hit in our house and I haven’t bought it for years, when I decided to remake the coffee cookies, I insisted on making them using regular coffee.

I must confess I had some difficulties with the quantities because egg+coffee made the dough too soft, and adding flour (and consequently more butter) reduced the percentage of coffee in the dough.

So, to increase the percentage of coffee, I tried removing the egg. What a thought, huh? 😄😀

It’s true that I’m not an example of a star pastry chef 😄🤯 but we like them, especially as breakfast cookies. They are crunchy and crumbly, yet light and delicate.

And they’re great as a treat, paired two by two with a layer of Nutella in between.

But since today’s recipe is supposed to be light, or at least try… um… pretend you didn’t read the previous sentence! 😁

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Difficulty: Easy
Cost: Affordable
Rest time: 30 Minutes
Preparation time: 10 Minutes
Portions: 25 Pieces
Cooking methods: Oven
Cuisine: Italian
Seasonality: All seasons

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
4.6 oz coffee
1/2 cup sugar
5 tbsp butter
1 tsp baking powder

Tools

Bowl
Rolling Pin
Cutting Board
Cookie Cutter
Parchment Paper
Baking Tray
Cooling Rack

Steps

Pour the flour into a bowl and add the baking powder.
In the well of the flour, pour in the softened butter cut into pieces, sugar, and (cold) coffee.
Work with your fingertips without warming the butter and incorporating the flour little by little.
Once a dough ball is obtained, refrigerate it for about half an hour.
Roll out the coffee shortcrust pastry with a rolling pin, preferably not too thinly.
Cut the cookies with a cutter of the desired shape.
Place the cookies on a baking tray or the oven tray lined with parchment paper.
Bake in a 350°F oven for about 15-20 minutes. Check the cooking as the time may vary depending on the thickness of the pastry.
Let the cookies cool on a rack.
VARIATIONS: I haven’t yet tried making these cookies using oil instead of butter, but I don’t doubt it’s a feasible variation (using no more than 2 oz of oil). However, I tried the variation with barley coffee instead of regular coffee and I recommend it, they turned out great. 😊