Gluten Free Maple Oat and Dried Cherry Shortbread Cookies

Gluten Free Maple Oat and Dried Cherry Shortbread

By Irvin Lin

Sara Forte, of The Sprouted Kitchen, makes these cookies with a drizzle of chocolate and no dried cherries, but I wanted to adapt them to something more morning breakfast in flavor (not that I’m opposed to the occasional chocolate in the morning to kick start things). For me though, this meant adding a sweetener other than table sugar (I went with maple sugar to give it that maple flavor) and some chopped dried cherries. Maple sugar can be found in specialty stores like Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods, but if you don’t have it, feel free to use dark brown sugar. Because I want to keep the cookies crumbly, I decided to covert them to a gluten free variation, using millet flour and mesquite flour, as both add a great flavor to the cookie, getting the resulting cookie into a nice moist but crumbly state. Both flours can also be found at health and upscale stores like Whole Foods or online. However, if you don’t have millet and mesquite flour and don’t feel like tracking them down or you don’t have any issues with gluten, feel free to just use all purpose flour in its place (105 grams or about 3/4 cup). This recipe requires the dough to rest in the fridge overnight, so keep that in mind when making it and plan accordingly.

Heavily adapted by a recipe from The Sprouted Kitchen Cookbook.

Ingredients
165 g (1 1/2 cups) old fashion rolled oats (gluten free if that is a concern)
75 g (1/2 cup + 1 tablespoon) millet flour
32 g (1/4 cup) mesquite flour
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
113 g (1/2 cup or 1 stick) unsalted butter, cold
75 g (1/2 cup) maple sugar
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 large egg
75 g (2 1/2 oz or 1/2 cup) chopped dried sour cherries
2 tablespoon turbinado or demerera sugar (sometimes sold under the brand name Sugar in the Raw)

Special Equipment
Food processor
Stand mixer (though you can use a spoon and some elbow grease)
Baking sheet
Parchment paper or silpat

Directions
1. Place the oats in a food processor and pulse until the oats have been reduced to a coarse consistency like grits or polenta. You want to leave the oats a bit more chunky to give the cookie some texture. Once you achieved the right texture, add the millet flour, mesquite flour, salt and cinnamon. Pulse a few more times to blend.

2. Cut the butter into 1/2 inch chunks and place in the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Add the maple sugar and beat on medium until the butter is light and fluffy. Add the vanilla extract, almond extract and egg. Beat on medium to incorporate; the batter might look like it is breaking, but don’t worry about that. It’ll come together once you add the dry ingredients.

3. Add the dry ingredients from the food processor and beat on low speed until a dough forms. Turn to medium speed and beat for a minute more to fluffy the dough up. Add the chopped dried cherries and mix on low until incorporated. Don’t worry if the dough seems a little sticky, that’s normal.

4. Sprinkle the turbinado sugar evenly onto a cutting board. Scrape the dough out into your hands and start to form a tube of dough. Once the dough is roughly formed into a tube, place it on the cutting board and roll it out to an even tube of dough, roughly 12 inches long. The turbinado sugar should keep the dough from sticking to the cutting board, but if it sticks, add a little more sugar. You should have an even coating of turbinado sugar all over the tube of dough. Roll the dough tightly in a plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least two to three hours or preferably overnight.

5. Once the dough has chilled, preheat the oven to 350˚F and line a baking sheet with a silpat or a pie parchment paper. Pull the dough out and unwrap it from the plastic wrap. Slice off 1/2 inch thick cookies and place on the backing sheet. Bake for 12 – 14 minutes or until the edges start to get golden brown (or a little longer if you want your cookies to be more crisp). Cool on the sheet for five minutes before moving to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes 24 cookies.