New Recipe #17: Key lime coolers

After my failed attempt at the perfect lemon cookie, Stephanie alerted me to a recipe for key lime cookies that she thought might do well with a substitution of lemon for lime. Intrigued by the shortcake nature of the final product, I printed out the recipe for future reference.

The recipe originally hailed from good old Betty Crocker, and its homespun origins made me feel rather quaint, even as I said a little eulogy for my arteries in light of the whole, staggering cup of butter. With powdered sugar, cornstarch, and flour, the dough came together easily, and it looked quite festive with its flecks of lime zest. Because I cannot leave well enough alone, I sloshed a little margarita mix into the dough. Hey, my lime didn’t yield quite enough zest, and the mix was lime-flavored, so what harm could it do? The rest of the shaping process was new to me, what with the flattening with a sugar-covered drinking glass, but the balls of dough flattened out nicely and without much protest. Because my kitchen was roaring hot, and my hands were too warm to handle such a buttery dough, I chose to drop the cookies rather than roll them out, and I think the crinkly edges impart a certain rustic charm. At least, that’s what I told myself at the time.

After eight minutes in the oven, my cookies emerged with slightly golden crusts, but they were pleasingly pliable when I removed them from the pan. I put together the lime glaze with some degree of trepidation since the glaze was my main downfall with the buttermilk lemon cookies. I added a bit of green food coloring, per Stephanie’s suggestion, and I, uh, may or may not have splashed in some more margarita mix at that point. Ahem. In any case, I was disconcerted because the glaze was really runny, and it wasn’t clear to me it would harden into a solid coating. I tried adding more powdered sugar to thicken it up until I realized that my strategy would render the glaze capable of eating straight through a tooth, so I finally threw caution to the wind and started glazing the cookies, despite my misgivings.

People, I think I should swear off glazes. My light green, zest-flecked glaze ran all over the cookies, instead of adhering to the centered circle I pictured. Okay, if I am really honest, I pictured a glaze that I could use to draw little semicircle lime slices. Why can’t glaze be the same consistency of puff paint? By the second wire rack of cookies, I had finally gotten used to the viscosity, and the last dozen or so appear to show much more restraint than their greedy precursors.

I reluctantly chose an ugly cookie for a taste test, and I was pleasantly surprised! Because the glaze was so thin, the cookie soaked up the sugary shock due to the shortbread texture. The crumb was nice and soft, and even with the sweetness, there was a tang of lime and tequila in the background. These cookies are a cool summer treat, and I’d make them again, but definitely for a crowd. One needs to spread out the effect of all of that butter! I wonder… what about using some rum and mint extract for a mojito cookie? Very interesting, indeed.