Pumpkin butter spread, cinnamon and ginger give these tender shortbread cookies a warm spice flavor. Enjoy these with a cup of hot cider or hot cocoa on a chilly winter night!
It’s the 4th Annual Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap, hosted by Lindsay of Love & Olive Oil and Julie ofThe Little Kitchen! The swap brings together food bloggers from around the world to exchange cookies and raise money for Cookies for Kids' Cancer. Each blogger that participates donates a small sum to CFKC, and the swap's brand partners — OXO, Dixie Crystals, California Olive Ranch and Brownie Brittle — will match the total sum donated by the food bloggers, up to $3,000!
I've been a part of these cookie swaps all four years, and it's been a great experience. Obviously. If it wasn't a great experience, why would I keep doing it? Haha!
I submitted my information to join the swap, and a few weeks later received the names of my matches: Jess of On Sugar Mountain, Val of A Scrumptious Life, and Chineka of Savor the Baking. In return, I received cookies from Lissa of The Flourishing Baker, Liz of That Skinny Chick Can Bake!, and Kristen of Babcakes Bakery.
I will confess that I chose to make these cookies purely because I had all of the ingredients on-hand to make them. And because, come on, pumpkin! They are easy, yet different. I had originally had planned to make fabulously-decorated sugar cookies, but never got around to them. Honestly, I'm glad I made these instead.
These cookies called for a method of rolling that I'd never used before: rolling the dough between two sheets of parchment. It's really genius, however. I'd normally sprinkle the dough with flour to prevent sticking, but then that extra flour gets incorporated into the cookie dough. You want shortbread to be very crumbly and tender, and adding extra flour can cause these cookies to be tough.
This dough is very sticky, so after rolling between the parchment, I cut the cookies an inch apart. Then I pulled up the scrap dough, and moved the parchment with the cut cookies onto the baking sheet. No misshapen cookies from trying to transfer them to the baking pan!
If you have a food blog and are interested in participating in next year's swap, sign up for notifications with this form!
Want to see all 471 recipes from the Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap? Check out Part 1 on Love & Olive Oil, and Part 2 on The Little Kitchen.
Pumpkin Butter Shortbread Cookies #FBCookieSwap
Ingredients
- 1 cup pumpkin butter, store-bought or homemade
- 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
- ⅔ c powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 2 ¼ cups flour
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ⅛ teaspoon ground allspice
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
- Place the pumpkin butter, unsalted butter and powdered sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer. Cream on medium speed for 2 to 3 minutes. Add the vanilla and mix another 30 seconds to a minute.
- Sift together the flour, salt and spices, and add to the stand mixer. Mix on low speed just until combined.
- Scrape the dough onto a piece of parchment paper about the size of a cookie sheet. Place a second sheet of parchment on top, and roll the dough to ⅛th to ¼th of an inch thickness. Place on a cookie sheet and place in the freezer for 15 minutes.
- Use a 2 ¼-inch round or fluted cookie cutter to cut cookies, about an inch apart. Pull up the scraps (leaving the cut cookies in place on the parchment), and place on a new sheet of parchment. Re-roll the scraps and place back in the freezer.
- Bake the cookies just until they begin to brown at the edges, about 15 to 16 minutes. Immediately transfer cookies to a cooling rack.
- Repeat with the remaining dough, cutting, re-rolling and freezing, until all the dough is gone.
Slightly adapted from I Bake, He Shoots
Cookin Canuck says
Shortbread cookies have been one of my favorites since I was a kid, and I can only imagine how good this pumpkin butter version must taste!
Victoria says
Yay for the cookie swap! So fun 🙂 and these look amazing! Pumpkin shortbread...who knew. Fantastic idea.
Marjory @ Dinner-Mom says
Such a fun exchange. These look delicious!
The Food Hunter says
Sounds like lots of delicious fun
Paula - bell'alimento says
I'm a sucker for shortbread cookies.
Martha @ A Family Feast says
What a great idea adding pumpkin butter to shortbread! These look delicious!
Amy @Very Culinary says
Sounds like fun! Wish I was on the receiving end of these cookies!
[email protected] Mom says
Cookie Swaps can be exhausting but so much fun!
Angie | Big Bear's Wife says
ooo My Aunt and I were just talking about Pumpkin Butter the other day! I"ll have to make these for her!
Liz says
Such wonderful cookies! I wish I had some spare pumpkin butter to give these a try 🙂
Erin @ Texanerin Baking says
These sound and look amazing and I like how well they must ship! My cookies always arrive in pieces. I definitely need to do some better planning!
Stephanie says
Ohh pumpkin butter? YUM!
Lora @cakeduchess says
The simpler the cookies the better for me! Love these delightful shortbread cookies (yay for pumpkin butter!!)
Rose | The Clean Dish says
I saw pumpkin butter at Trader Joe's and have been wondering since what I could make with it. Perfect timing!! These cookies look magnificent!
Chineka @ Savor The Baking says
These cookies were so delicious Coleen. They had just enough pumpkin flavor in them. 🙂
Des @ Life's Ambrosia says
Just when I thought I was all pumpkind out you make these and make me crave it all over again. Yum!
Heather / girlichef says
I love shortbread and I love pumpkin butter, so these seem like a natural - love the combination of them together!
Nutmeg Nanny says
I love shortbread cookies and the idea of making them with pumpkin make me giddy. LOVE!
Bea says
I loved participating in my first ever cookie swap and certainly would have loved to get a box of those beauties 🙂
Kate @ Diethood says
WHOA!! Nothing better than pumpkin better, but in a cookie?!? YESSS PLEASE!
Ginny McMeans says
I have never had pumpkin butter but now I will! These look great!
Melanie says
Such a great way to use pumpkin butter! I'm always looking for new cookie recipes. This looks like a keeper!
Kim (Feed Me, Seymour) says
Pumpkin butter IN cookies? I think I just drooled all over myself.
Lauren @ Healthy Delicious says
i love shortbread. Adding pumpkin butter is such a fun idea!
Amanda @The Kitcheneer says
Im loving this idea of adding pumpkin butter to cookies! YUM
Laura says
I just made these and they are quite tasty! I just want to tell anyone reading the comments that you definitely need to follow the directions. No cheating! Yes, you have to roll on parchment paper, otherwise it'll make a gooey mess. Yes, you have to freeze and refreeze the dough. If you're impatient, just do simple chores while the dough refreezes or watch some TV or play on your phone to kill time. Yes you need to roll to the prescribed thickness- if you have trouble estimating, using a rolling pin that you can set a height on makes the task simple.
Anyway, thank you for the lovely recipe to help me use up my extra pumpkin butter. It's very good!