Cookies, Cookies, Cookies! And today’s recipe is a shortbread thumbprint cookie. Buttery, melt-in-your-mouth, lightly sweet, and perfect little bites of heaven coming out of the oven. I don’t think there’s anyone that could resist these. Shortbread cookies are always welcome at our house, and they fly off the place in 2.5 seconds every. single. time. With a prep time of around 15 minutes, they are almost too dangerous. Buttery, sugary, jam-filled, glazed, fruity, and perfect for holiday gift-giving. This is what a great shortbread cookie should be. I love shortbread in any form, be it these thumbprint cookies or a good slice-and-bake shortbread cookie. My favorite are the Twix kind topped with melted caramel and chocolate – basically a Twix bar in cookie form. When I was something nostalgic, classics like these thumbprint cookies do it for me. My family has been making them for close to three decades, and nothing screams Christmas to me like these do! And we all know calories don’t count when it comes to Christmas cookies! My family’s recipe for thumbprint cookies calls for the dough to be dipped into egg whites and then dunked into a bowl of chopped pecans or walnuts. I absolutely love them, but sometimes you want a little icing on top and skip the nuttiness!
Ingredients for thumbprint cookies:
Butter: You’ll want to use softened, room temperature butter for this recipe. I like to use salted butter because I prefer the cookies to be slightly less sweet. However, unsalted butter will also work for this recipe. You can also add a ¼ teaspoon salt if you only have unsalted butter on hand.Granulated Sugar: Adds sweetness to the recipe. We’re using a lot less sugar in this recipe than we would in typical cookie recipes, but this is because most of the sweetness comes from the preserves we’ll use in the center of the cookie dough.Egg Yolk: You’ll need one large egg yolk for this recipe. The protein in the egg yolk prevents too much gluten from developing in the cookie recipe. This leaves you with a more delicious crumbly, and tender cookie.Vanilla Extract: I like to use a splash of vanilla extract, but if you have vanilla bean paste on hand, you could also use a bit of that. If you’re a fan of almond extract, you can also use a combination of vanilla and almond.All Purpose Flour: A typical ingredient in most cookie recipes.Raspberry Preserves or Apricot Jam: Strawberry, apricot, and raspberry jam work for this recipe. If you aren’t a fan of jams or preserves, you can also use lemon curd in place of the jam.Confectioners Sugar: We’ll use the confectioners or powder sugar to make a glaze to top the cookies with. Drizzle the glaze on top of the cookies once they have cooled.Milk or Half and Half: Use a tiny splash of milk or half and half, along with the powdered sugar, to make a glaze for the cookies.
Making Shortbread Thumbprint Cookies:
If you like these thumbprint cookies, you may also like:
Raspberry Almond Linzer CookiesThe Best Cut Out Sugar CookiesNani’s Pistachio Cardamom CookiesThe Best Chewy Chocolate Chip CookiesEasy Maple Pecan Shortbread Cookies
STORE: Keep cookies at room temperature for up to 3 days or in the refrigerator for 5 days.DOUBLE OR TRIPLE: Recipe can be doubled or tripled to make a larger batch of cookies. I recommend only baking one sheet pan of cookies at a time.
Update Dec 2023: after making these cookies for almost a decade, I’ve made minor instruction updates to get these cookies out faster! Original recipe called for the dough to be chilled in the fridge for 2½ hours or even overnight. This method gets them out within an hour!
