Chocolate Dipped Cinnamon Shortbread Cookies

Chocolate dipped cinnamon shortbread cookies with a hint of ginger and orange and decorated with festive sprinkles. These lightly spiced cookies are half dipped for a more modern look of a Christmas tree cookie. Easy to make too!

Decorated cookie cut outs are fun year round but seem to be the most popular during the holidays. I love going for simply decorated or dipped, I leave the super fancy royal icing decorating to the experts.

I love doing half dipped cookies in chocolate. This way you can try just the cookie or the cookie with some chocolate. The cookie is so good on its own but even better with the Chocolate.

These were inspired by my Chocolate Gingerbread Cookies ( SO GOOD and also half dipped with sprinkles) and my Soft Spiced Gingerbread Cut Out Cookies ( also tree shaped!) I do love a tree shaped cookie!

Ingredients:

These are a basic cinnamon shortbread cookie with a little almond flour and cornstarch in them for texture, crispiness as well as melt in your mouth tenderness.

• All Purpose Flour
• Almond Flour - ground toasted almond flour
• Cornstarch - keeps the cookies crisp and tender at the same time. My "secret" cookie ingredient
• Cinnamon - use a little or the larger amount for a big hit of cinnamon
• Ginger - complements the cinnamon and orange really nicely
• Kosher Salt
• Orange Zest
• Sugar
• Egg Yolks
• Butter - unsalted and at cool room temperature
• Dark Chocolate (70% - can also use semi sweet, milk or white chocolate if you like)
• Coconut Oil - to melt with the chocolate
• Sprinkles - I love these "Ugly Xmas Sweater" sprinkles from Supernatural. I bought them from Sprouts.

See recipe card for quantities.

Instructions

Again as these are a simple to make cinnamon shortbread cookie recipe you don't need to use as many bowls as I have. I use more to show all the different ingredients.

Zest the orange over the sugar. You can double the amount of zest if you like.

Rub the zest and sugar together with your fingers until well incorporated into the sugar.

Combine spices and salt into the bowl with the flour.

Whisk together well. You can do this while the butter and sugar are creaming together in the mixer.

I forgot to take pics of the butter, sugar and eggs mixing in the mixing bowl, but you get the idea.

Divide dough into two discs, wrap in plastic wrap then chill.

Form into ball shape with your hands

Hint: Chilling the dough between cutting out and lifting the cut outs and placing on the prepared baking tray is so much easier when the dough is cold. I like to freeze for just a few minutes before popping the trees out. This also helps with keeping them from spreading while baking.

Pro Tip:

Roll out your dough between pieces of wax paper instead of a flour dusted counter. This does two things - easier to lift the dough with cut outs on to a tray to chill before popping them out to bake and doesn't add excess flour to the dough which will make the cookies tougher and more bland.

Place the cookies an inch or two apart on your baking sheet. They don't spread when baking.

Cool completely before dipping in chocolate.

I just had to get these sprinkles.

This sprinkle mix has candy canes, bells, stars, trees, gingerbread men, jimmies and little balls. I love the colors.

Substitutions

These are a pretty simple recipe and you can make them fit a gluten free diet - I have not tried without egg yolks to make them vegan.

• Flour - You can substitute gluten free flour for the all purpose flour
• Butter - use dairy free butter if you like
• Almond flour - any other nut flour such as hazlenut or cashew, if no nuts needed can try my shortbread recipe or substitute oat flour.

Equipment

Not a whole lot of equipment is needed for these cinnamon shortbread cookies. This is what I used:

• Bowls
• Zester - mircoplaner
• Mixer - you can use a stand mixer or a hand mixer
• Wax paper - for rolling out the dough and setting the dipped cookies onto it before freezing to set the chocolate. The dipped and frozen cookies will stick to parchment, not wax paper.
• Baking Sheets - I love using USA pans.
• Parchment Paper - I either buy in bulk or splurge on pre-cut sheets
• Cookie Spatula
• Wire Cooling Racks

And the most important piece of equipment for baking - A food scale.

Weighing ingredients Vs using cups:

I use my food scale and weigh out ingredients in grams because this is the most accurate way to get the best quality baked goods. Cups aren't accurate because not only are all cups not the same the sizes vary from brand to brand as well as from different countries. I have done tests with different brands of measuring cups and they all came out with different weights after I did the spoon and level as well as scoop method and then weighed in grams.

Baking is a science and science needs accuracy. Weighing is accurate and precise. Not to mention a lot easier. Another issue with cups is that I have no control over how people use measuring cups to measure dry ingredients especially flour. You could pack in way too much which would result in a sub-par baked good. Too much flour could throw everything off. Same with not enough. Not to mention also some ingredients are difficult to measure in cups such as nuts, dried fruit, chocolate etc. This is why weighing in grams is the most accurate.

I also use grams for most liquid measure since 100 grams equals 100 ml of water. Smaller amounts of items measured in teaspoons I usually leave as teaspoons, tablespoons are sometimes listed in grams as well but for the most part the different tablespoons I have used have all resulted in the same amount. Aside from cute, decorative ceramic tablespoons and teaspoons are never accurate. Those are better as decoration than for being used for baking.

Storage:

You can store these cinnamon shortbread cookies in an airtight container at room temperature up to a week before they start to taste stale. I keep them in a freezer for maximum freshness. They will last up to three months this way. Three months is kind of the rule of thumb for frozen cookie time. After that they may start to develop freezer burn.

Other cookies to try:

More half dipped cookies:

"Recipe"

Chocolate Dipped Cinnamon Shortbread Cookies Recipe

Shanna

Tender, buttery melt in your mouth shortbread cookies spiced with cinnamon and ginger and a hint of orange. Dipped in dark chocolate and decorated with fun holiday sprinkles. Makes 56 3” shaped cookies

5 from 1 vote

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Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 1 hour hr

Dough chilling and cooling time 4 hours hrs

Total Time 5 hours hrs 20 minutes mins

Servings 56 cookies

Ingredients

  

• 200 G All purpose flour
• 75 g cornstarch
• 50 g ground almond flour
• 2 ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
• ½ teaspoon ground ginger (can go up to 1 teaspoon if you like)
• ½ teaspoon kosher salt
• 175 g unsalted butter (softened but still cool room temperature)
• 100 g granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons orange zest
• 2 egg yolks (From large eggs)
• 200 g dark chocolate (you will have leftover chocolate)
• 2 teaspoons coconut oil

Instructions

 

• Baking time is approximate - depends on how many cookies you can get on your baking sheets at a time. I make this in 4 batches for 40 min total baking time.
• In a medium bowl whisk together the flour, cornstarch, almond flour, spices and salt
• If using a stand mixer start creaming the butter to soften it. (If using a hand mixer, combine the sugar and zest first then start mixing the butter. This is so you can then add the sugar mixture as you are using the hand mixer for the butter instead of needing to stop the mixer then combine the sugar and zest.)
• Add the zest to the sugar and rub together with fingers to disperse the zest and release the orange oils into the sugar.
• Add the sugar mixture to the butter and cream together for a few minutes until light and fluffy, add in the egg yolks one at a time, mixing well between each additions. Scrape down the sides of the bowl when needed.
• Add in the flour mixture and mix on low until no more streaks of flour are seen.
• Remove the dough from the bowl and knead slightly. Divide the dough in half then wrap each in plastic wrap. Chill for 30 minutes before rolling out and baking. See notes for making the dough ahead of time.
• When ready to bake, heat your oven to 350 Deg F. Prepare baking sheets with parchment paper.
• Roll out the dough disks between sheets of wax paper to ¼ inch thick. Do not use flour.
• Cut out with 3 inch cutters ( trees or whatever you like). Slide the cut outs still on the wax paper onto a cookie sheet, and refrigerate or freeze for a few minutes until firm (If you have the space - might have to be done on a smaller baking sheet to fit)
• One firm, pop the cookies out and place an inch or two apart (they don't spread) on the parchment lined sheets. Bake for 10 minutes until the cookies are set and edges are just barely golden.
• Let cool for a minute on the baking sheet then carefully transfer to a wire cooling rack to cool completely before dipping in chocolate and decorating. Repeat with all remaining dough, pressing the dough back together into a disk and re rolling as needed.
• Once all the cookies are baked and cooled they are ready to decorate.
• Melt the chocolate either in a double boiler or in a microwave safe bowl with the coconut oil. Stir until smooth. Set out a baking sheet with wax paper.
• Transfer to a bowl that is deep enough to dip the cookies in halfway. I find that making more chocolate than needed helps so I am not having to tilt the bowl of chocolate back and forth to get the cookies covered.
• Place the dipped cookies on the wax paper lined tray and decorate with sprinkles. I just sprinkled them over the top - you can place them more carefully with tweezers if you want a design or pattern.
• Freeze the cookies to set up the chocolate then transfer the cookies to a freezer safe bag or airtight container. Use a sheet of wax paper between layers of cookies in the bag or container so they don’t stick to one another. Repeat until all cookies are dipped and decorated. Save the chocolate for another use.
• Cookies will store at room temperature up to a week, in the freezer up to three months.

Notes

Make the dough ahead of time - you can make the dough and form into discs, wrap tightly in plastic wrap then place in a freezer safe bag to either keep refrigerated for 3 days before baking or up to three months if freezing. Thaw to soft enough to roll out before baking. The dough should be soft but still cool.

 

If it’s your first time making this recipe then make sure you read all of the information in the main post as it includes lots of additional tips, as well as the answers to some common questions.

If you have any further questions then do let me know in the comments and or email me [email protected] and I’ll do my best to help.

If you choose to make substitutions to the recipe that I have not tested yet please do so at your own risk. I cannot guarantee the same results if you change a lot of the ingredients or method. However, if any of your changes are successful I would love to hear about it and will add to my recipe notes for other readers to try as well.