Pistachio Shortbread Cookies with Dark Chocolate Filling
This Post May Contain Affiliate Links. Please Read Our Disclosure PolicyOver the past several weeks my kitchen has been used more often than when I ran my little B&B. (That may be a stretch, but you get the idea.) Except for the cleanup, I find baking and cooking extremely therapeutic. Plus, the rewards for my efforts are always worth it.
As you know, I’ve been pushing myself to try some new things this year and hope to venture into more of the savory side of things soon. But for now, I’m happy to focus on the sweeter things in life.
Speaking of pushing myself, I’m always up for a good challenge. So when my friends at KitchenAid gave me the challenge to MAKE SHORTBREAD TALL, I was in! The only other time I’ve tried my hands at shortbread was when I made one of my family’s favorite cookies, this White Chocolate and Cherry Shortbread. KitchenAid wanted to see if I could make Pistachio Shortbread Cookie Sandwiches with a Dark Chocolate Filling. I was actually thrilled to get this challenge since I had never really made something like this before. And I love me some pistachios!
I was fortunate to find shelled pistachios at my local grocery store. (I figured I’d have to shell them so this was a big win!) I wanted to include pistachios in the dough and also sprinkle some on the cookies. For the dough, I needed the pistachios to be finely chopped – almost ground. I knew my KitchenAid® Food Processor, with its three power settings, ExactSlice™ System, and Ultra Wide Mouth™ Feed Tube, would meet the challenge. It’s capable of slicing, shredding, kneading, chopping and puréeing almost any food. I threw about a half a cup of shelled pistachios in with the standard blade, turned it on high and within minutes I had exactly what I was looking for. This would infuse the cookie with flavor without being overly crunchy.
I then threw in some more pistachios and gave them a quick buzz around, leaving them a little chunkier. This would add a nice crunch to the top of the cookie. Perfect!
With the pistachios ready, I pulled out my stand mixer to get the dough working. As I learned from the recipe, shortbread isn’t easy. It actually took me two attempts. So I thought I would share a couple tricks to make it easier for you.
First, make sure the butter is super soft. Leave it out overnight. When you are ready to make your dough, unwrap the butter, set it on a plate, and give it about 10 – 15 seconds in the microwave so it just starts to melt. Since there is no liquid in the dough, this helps to prevent your dough from getting too crumbly.
Second, when rolling out the dough, work in small batches. If the dough is still a little too crumbly, sprinkle it with a little milk. That will help to bring things back together. I think shortbread is one of those things, like pie crust, that you need to get comfortable with “how it feels” before you can perfect your art.
The chocolate filling and glaze are very simple to make and come together quickly. I used dark chocolate, but if you prefer milk chocolate, feel free to make the substitution.
Let me show you how to make these.
And that completes your cookies. Grab a cup of milk, coffee, or tea and enjoy!
The combination of the sweet cookie, dark chocolate, and salty pistachios is kind of magical.
To make matters even better, they totally look like mini-masterpieces. What do you think? As you know from previous recipes I posted here, I especially love doing a cross-hatch with the chocolate. It’s simple, but looks so professional.
Pistachio Shortbread Cookies
Ingredients
Pistachio Cookies
- 1.5 cups unsalted butter softened
- 1 cup sugar plus extra for sprinkling
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/4 cups pistachios very finely chopped
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
Chocolate Filling
- 1 cup unsalted butter softened
- 1 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 3 tablespoons dark cocoa powder
- 2 tablespoons milk
- 1 tablespoon vanilla
Chocolate Drizzle
- 6 ounces dark chocolate
- 1 tablespoon vegetable shortening (Crisco)
- 1/8 cup pistachios coarsely chopped
Instructions
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and 1 cup sugar until combined. Then add the vanilla.
- Next add the flour, pistachios, and salt to the mixture. Mix on low speed until the dough starts to come together. Shape the dough into a flat disc, wrap in plastic and chill for at least 30 minutes.
- Once the dough is chilled, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- On a lightly floured surface roll out the dough so that it is 1/4-inch thick. Cut out the cookies with a round cookie cutter or the top of a round glass. Place the cookies on an ungreased baking sheet and sprinkle with sugar. Bake for 15 to 18 minutes, until the edges begin to brown. Allow to cool at room temperature.
- To make the filling, in your mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, combine the butter, powdered sugar, cocoa powder, milk, and vanilla. Mix until smooth. If necessary, you can add more milk for a smoother filling or more powdered sugar to stiffen it up.
- Once the cookies are cool, fill a piping bag or a plastic baggie with the chocolate filling. Pipe onto half of the cookies. Then top with a second cookie and gently press until the filling spreads to the edges.
- For the drizzle, melt the chocolate chips and shortening in a microwavable bowl (or in a double broiler). Allow the mixture to cool slightly, then transfer to a plastic bag. Snip off a tiny portion of one corner of the bag and drizzle the chocolate on top of the cookies. Sprinkle with chopped pistachios for a garnish.
I made chocolate chip cookies from scratch
My challenge was finally mastering home made yeast rolls.
These look fabulous – I have to try them! I love your food photography too; these are beautifully photographed.
Making a good lasagna that does not fall apart has always been my challenge. I had to go gluten free last year, and discovered the gluten free lasagna noodles helped me make my first ever successful lasagna!
Gorgeous cookies Michael! I could eat 10 of these. I love the chocolate and pistachio combination!
My daughter does all the cooking, so my only challenge is not eating too much 🙂
Wow – those look so good! A recent challenge was what to do with too much left over roast without it tasting like roast every night – I made BBQ beef sandwiches and enchiladas.
Realizing I am no baker…I make a shortcut with premade pizza dough to make focaccia! So simple yet delicious!
My recent kitchen challenge was getting ready to bake and discovering that I had no flour! I did a little quick Googling and made some oatmeal lace cookies. Then I added flour to the shopping list : )
we just had 5 college kids at our home for a week during their spring break. I never could have gotten food prepared w/o my food processor-they helped but you know a kitchen is never big enough.
Most recently I learned to make citrus curd. For some reason I thought it was going to be extraordinarily hard but it really wasn’t! I made blood orange and lemon, both delicious, and made a lemon cream crumb cake and ate the blood orange on scones, so delicious!
I wanted to conquer making the perfect cioppino so I made a whole bunch of different recipes and tweaked the one I liked best. Now I make enough for dinner and extra sauce for the freezer.
Creme brûlée has always scared me. Bought a torch and whipped some up. Easier than I thought. These cookies look delicious.
I brought in a Roomba and a Mint to clean up.. THAT was a challenge.
My biggest challenge lately was finding pancetta for carbonara. I’m not in a food dessert but there are things that are hard to find (like semolina flour, which was actually advantageous since once I found some and used it to make pasta, I found the family preferred the texture when using AP flour) I found that uncured, thick cut bacon is a wonderful substitute!
I finally used my crock pot for breakfast. I made steel cut oats with apples and raisins.
These cookies are a perfect after dinner snack with coffee !
I recently grilled a pork butt, and it turned out AWESOME!
I posted a tweet too: https://twitter.com/AnnaZed/status/441258713832124416
I have recently been on a binge of making meringues, Swiss meringue icing and even a Pavlova. I don’t know why I feared the egg whites before, though I did. They are so easy and every one is so impressed. I make the superfine sugar that I need (since I haven’t seen it in the store) in my KitchenAid blender actually!