The cookie drought is over! Hallelujah!

I think my soul just missed baking. Now how dramatic is that?

Truth is, as much as I love cooking and throwing together meals for friends, baking has always been my first love. Which is a bit strange, I’ll admit–since I don’t really eat most of the things I bake. My sometime sweet tooth allows for me to taste whatever baked good I’ve made for quality-checking purposes, but I usually try to pawn all of my baking off on others (as my friends will attest). But certain cookies wiggle their way into my heart despite my best intentions… this is definitely one of them.

The original recipe actually uses olive oil and fresh rosemary for a savory-sweet twist; I chose to use Kona coffee because we recently returned from Hawaii with bags of the stuff! The basic recipe without my additions (powdered sugar, butter, salt and flour) make for an excellent basic shortbread recipe with which you can try other combinations with. In fact, I’m pretty sure you’ll see variations of this recipe on this site in the months to follow…

The consistency of these shortbread cookies is fantastic: light and crisp, with just a touch of vanilla sweetness. The small, coarse grounds of Kona coffee add texture and a very mild coffee bite; the glaze is strong but sweet, almost like coffee ice cream. I enjoyed these with coffee (obviously) but they go well with a nice hot cup of tea or by themselves!

If you don’t have vanilla beans, you can substitute 1 tsp. of vanilla extract; I know vanilla beans are expensive and not everybody has them lying around. Likewise, you can use any coarsely-ground coffee instead of Kona–just make sure the bean is a milder and less bitter variety. The roast should still be medium to dark, though. Lastly, the glaze–James and I are huge coffee fans, so I threw in the espresso powder to kick up the coffee flavor. If you don’t have it on-hand, you can make the glaze without and it will be fine–it’ll just be lighter in color.

And if this all looks like too much work for you, you’re in luck: Trader Joe’s has a version of this cookie (in fact, their cookie is what inspired me to make this in the first place). I like to think that mine is better, but you can be the judge on that if you’d like.

Recipe adapted from The Blue Bottle Craft of Coffee: Growing, Roasting, and Drinking, with Recipes.