Oh Canada!

Cookies in honor of Canada Day

To recognize our dear friends to the north, I made these Maple Shortbread cookies in the shape of a maple leaf and decorated them in a Canadian-flag theme.

This photo is kind of a funky cookie, but the rest of the photos were pretty bad. But you get the idea.

The cookie recipe is in 2 parts so it takes a while for the maple butter to cool enough to make dough out of.

Maple Butter
2/3 cup maple syrup
1 cup butter, softened

In a small saucepan, bring maple syrup to a boil and cook until it reduces by half, about 10 to 15 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool. Add the butter and stir until completely blended. Place in refrigerator until firm. Makes1 cup.

Shortbread - this is simple!
1 cup maple butter
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt.

Combine the ingredients in a food processor. Pulse using the steel knife just until well combined and form a ball. This should take less than 30 seconds.

Flatten into a disk shape. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate until the dough is well chilled. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Position rack to centre of oven. Remove dough from fridge and roll to 1/8-inch thickness. Cut dough into desired shapes. Place cookies on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake until slightly golden brown, approximately 10 to 15 minutes.
Makes about three dozen two-inch cookies.

I used a Betty Crocker white icing recipe with slightly more butter than Betty calls for (she actually called for margarine, pretty funny considering the recipe is labeled "White Butter Frosting" - 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar, 1/2 cup butter, 1 tsp. vanilla and 1 Tbsp milk, blended with an electric mixer til smooth.

Spread icing on cool cookies. Place a strip of paper over the middle of each cookie and sprinkle with red sugar.