• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Home
  • All Recipes
    • Cakes and Desserts
    • Main Courses
    • Light Meals
    • Sides, Salads and Snacks
    • Drinks
  • Tips and Techniques
  • About
    • About Me
    • What is an Everyday Cook?
    • Privacy Policy
  • Sign up for the newsletter!
  • Everyday Cooks

Everyday Cooks

menu icon
go to homepage
  • All Recipes
    • Meals
    • Cakes and Desserts
    • Basics
    • Drinks
  • About
    • Everyday Cooks
    • E-mail
    • Facebook
    • Pinterest
  • subscribe
    search icon
    Homepage link
    • All Recipes
      • Meals
      • Cakes and Desserts
      • Basics
      • Drinks
    • About
      • Everyday Cooks
    • E-mail
    • Facebook
    • Pinterest
  • ×
    Home » Cakes and Desserts

    We use cookies · See Privacy Policy in footer · Post contains affiliate links

    Christmas Shortbread

    Cranberries and orange make this a festive Christmas Shortbread, coated with white chocolate. Quick and easy to make, and so much tastier when they're home-made.

    Jump to Recipe
    4 pieces of Christmas Shortbread part coated in white chocolate, on a china plate.
    Christmas Shortbread

    I'm a convert to cranberries, especially at Christmas, adding them to biscuits, biscotti and my Christmas cake (that I make only a week before Christmas). Even our favourite Cranberry Chicken Casserole is full of them!

    Add in some orange flavours and you have a festive shortbread that's quick and easy to make - a blessing at this time of year!

    Key Ingredients in Christmas Shortbread

    Butter

    You can't make shortbread without butter. I'm not fussy about salted or unsalted, but for this recipe, the butter is best cold and cubed.

    Sugar

    Icing sugar makes this a soft shortbread and the ingredients do mix in easily as the texture of the flour and sugar are the same.

    Flour

    Plain flour (all-purpose flour) is needed for shortbread - you don't want the biscuits to rise during the cooking process.

    Cranberries

    Dried cranberries, easy to buy in any supermarket. If you have more than you need and want more recipes to use them up, try Cranberry & Hazelnut Biscotti, or add them to the dried fruit in a last-minute Quick Christmas Cake or Fruit Bundt Cake.

    Orange flavours

    Orange zest and orange extract provide the flavour. Both together are best. If you only have oranges, use the zest of two instead of one. If you only have extract (so useful in so many recipes!) use 2 teaspoons.

    Secrets of Success

    Ingredients at the right temperature

    For Christmas Shortbread this means using butter straight from the fridge. That way, the ingredients mix better and you won't need to chill the mixture before you cook it.

    Don't over-mix

    Christmas Shortbread mixture in the tin

    The mixture will look fairly loose when it's done. It will start to clump in the processor, but it won't form a ball of dough

    Press the mixture firmly into the tin

    Christmas Shortbread mixture pressed into the tin

    Use your fingers and then a spoon to press the mixture firmly into the tin so that it all sticks together.

    Run the edge of the upsidedown spoon around the inside edge of the tin to pull the sides down and give a neat finish.

    Leave in the tin until it's cold

    Cut the cooked shortbread into fingers while it's still warm, but let it cool completely before you turn it out of the tin

    Coked Christmas Shortbread in the tin

    Decide on the decoration

    You don't need to dip the biscuits in chocolate to have a perfectly nice teatime treat. The chocolate really is an added extra - great if you have the time (and the chocolate).

    Fingers of Christmas Shortbread piled up

    What else do you need to make Christmas Shortbread?

    • 20cm square traybake tin - I use two sizes of tin for biscuits and traybakes. This is the smaller and the one I use the most
    • Baking parchment square - Lining the base of the tin with baking parchment makes cleaning easier - and the shortbread fingers come out easily
    • Magic Liner - For the tins that I use most often, I cut Magic Liner to fit and wash it in the dishwasher every time.

    IF YOU LIKE THIS...

    ...Why don’t you try:

    Cranberry and Hazelnut Biscotti on a white plate

    Cranberry and Hazelnut Biscotti

    Cranberry and Hazelnut Biscotti are perfect with a cup of tea or coffee and they aren’t overly sweet. Biscotti are easy to make and will keep for at least a couple of weeks.
    Stained glass biscuits. Angels and Christmas trees with star-shaped windows of orange, red and yellow

    Stained Glass Biscuits

    Pretty Stained Glass Biscuits are great for baking with children.
    Mincemeat Pinwheels on a wire cooling rack

    Mincemeat Pinwheels

    An easy Christmas treat to make – a mince pie morsel without a lot of pastry

    Stockists

    20cm square baking tin

    20cm square traybake tin

    Buy Now →
    Baking parchment squares

    Baking parchment square

    Buy Now →
    Magic liner cut to fit baking tins and pans

    Magic liner

    Buy Now →

    Pin for later

    Hover over any picture on the page and hit the Save button to pin the image to one of your Pinterest boards.

    4 pieces of Christmas Shortbread part coated in white chocolate, on a china plate.

    Recipe

    4 pieces of Christmas Shortbread part coated in white chocolate, on a china plate.
    Print Recipe
    No ratings yet

    Christmas Shortbread

    Cranberry and orange Christmas Shortbread dipped in white chocolate. Quick and easy to make.
    Prep Time15 minutes mins
    Cook Time45 minutes mins
    Total Time1 hour hr
    Course: Teatime
    Cuisine: British
    Servings: 20
    Author: Susie@Everyday Cooks

    Ingredients

    For the Christmas Shortbread:

    • 200 g cold butter
    • 125 g  icing sugar
    • 300 g plain/all-purpose flour
    • Pinch of salt
    • 1-2 teaspoons orange extract (5-10ml)
    • 50 g dried cranberries finely chopped
    • 1 orange, zested

    For the optional decoration:

    • 150 g white chocolate
    • Edible sprinkles or decorations
    Prevent your screen from going dark

    Equipment

    Square traybake tin 20cm/8-inch
    Baking parchment square
    or
    Magic Liner

    Instructions

    Preparation:

    • Preheat the oven to 170°C/ 150°C fan/ gas mark 3/ 325°F
    • Line a 20cm square tin with baking parchment or magic liner
    • Roughly chop the cranberries (they will get chopped more later).

    For the Christmas Shortbread:

    • In a food processor,  blitz the butter, sugar, flour and pinch of salt until the mixture begins to clump together. The mixture won't be a solid lump
    • Add the orange extract and zest, and cranberries and pulse to combine
    • Press mixture into the prepared tin and level (using your hands or the back of a spoon is easiest). You need to push quite hard to firm up the dough
    • Prick dough well with a fork
    • Bake the shortbread for 45-50min or until  nicely golden.
    • While it’s still warm, cut the shortbread in half across the middle. Then cut each half into 10-12 fingers about 1.5-2cm (¾ inch) wide
    • Cool completely in the tin.

    For the decoration (optional):

    • Arrange the biscuits on a wire cooling rack set over a tray
    • Melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of barely simmering water or in 30-second bursts in the microwave.
      For step-by-step instructions see How to Melt Chocolate
    • Using a spoon, pour chocolate onto one end of each shortbread finger and gently spread with a knife. Decorate and leave to set for about an hour, or chill for about 20 minutes
    • Store in an airtight tin in a cool place, or in a sealed box in the fridge for up to a week.

    More Everyday Cake, Bakes and Dessert Recipes

    • Sherry Trifle decorated with cream and raspberries in a crystal bowl on a dark worktop
      Sherry Trifle
    • Small Christmas Loaf Cake decorated with marzipan, icing and marzipan stars. Two mugs of tea and a Christmas decorations in the background.
      Easy Christmas Loaf Cake
    • Half a Coconut Loaf Cake with a slice cut on a grey plate
      Coconut Loaf Cake
    • Stack of 6 Anzac Biscuits on a square white plate
      Anzac Biscuits

    Reader Interactions

    Comments

    No Comments

    Made this recipe or got a question? Let me know! Cancel reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

    Recipe Rating




    Primary Sidebar

    Hi, I'm Susie. Mostly I love cooking and baking, but combining work and home life often leaves me feeling that providing healthy, tasty food for my family is a chore. On those days I am decidedly an Everyday Cook...

    More about me →

    Popular Recipes

    • Selection of cakes and cookies for Easter.
      Best Easter Cakes
    • Pieces of Easter Rocky Road on a plate
      Easter Rocky Road
    • 8 Easter Nest Cupcakes full of mini eggs on a grey plate
      Easter Nest Cupcakes
    • Light Simnel Cake on a patterned plate on a pinkcloth
      Light Simnel Cake

    Footer

    ↑ back to top

    Privacy

    • Privacy Policy

    Newsletter

    • Sign Up! for emails and updates

    Contact

    • About
    • What is an Everyday Cook?

    Copyright © 2018-2021 Everyday Cooks

    Rate This Recipe

    Your vote:




    A rating is required
    A name is required
    An email is required