Recipe: Doraemon Lemon Shortbread

There are a few cartoon characters that my kids like, and one of them is Doraemon. So when I was at the baking shop and saw this cute Doraemon cookie cutter, I bought it without hesitation. 

Lemon Doraemon Shortbread

The lemon shortbread recipe that I tried was taken from the Australian Women's Weekly "Sweet" cookbook collection. In hindsight, using the Doraemon cookie cutter with this recipe may not have been the best of choices since the cookie dough is of the soft type, and is better suited for plain-shaped cookie cutters (circle/heart/stars) without intricate details. But still, we managed to make it work - after some practice, we knew to cut off the shape first with the cutter, place it on the baking tray, then only pressing on the other stamp with more details. Baby D helped me with this bake, and he was absolutely delighted to see the cute Doraemon's on the tray.

Baby D taking photos of mummy making shortbread for a change! ;P

Time to get to work.... rolling out the dough

This recipe uses a combination of salted and unsalted butter, which is said to give the yummiest results. We have to agree - this was indeed a lovely shortbread, very crumbly with a nice subtle tanginess and lovely fragrance from the lemon zest. And of course, making it in Doraemon shapes is well worth it when we get to see the happy smiles on our children's faces :)

Baby D & Doraemon :)

Doraemon Lemon Shortbread
Recipe by Baby Sumo, adapted from The Australian Women's Weekly "Sweet"
Preparation time: 30 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes
Makes 30


Ingredients
60g salted butter, softened at room temperature
60g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
2 tsp finely grated lemon zest
2 1/2 tbsp caster sugar
1 cup + 2 tbsp plain flour
2 tbsp rice flour

1. Preheat oven to 160°C/140°C fan-assisted. Grease two baking trays or line with greaseproof paper.

2. Using an electric mixer, beat butter, lemon zest, and caster sugar until light and fluffy.

3. Sift 1 cup plain flour and 2 tablespoon rice flour. Stir in to mix (from Step 2) in two batches. It should form a dough, if still sticky, add more flour, 1 tablespoon at a time. (I found that I needed 2 extra tablespoons of plain flour to form a dough).

4. Turn dough onto floured surface, and knead dough for 5 minutes.

Knead dough for about 5 mins

5. Using a rolling pin, roll dough between two sheets of baking parchment until 5mm thick. Using your cookie cutter, cut out desired shapes. Place about 3cm apart on trays.

Rolling out the dough

Cut into desired shapes

Place the cut cookie dough on a greased baking tray

6. Bake in preheated oven for about 10 minutes, it will still be a pale yellow when you remove it from the oven but this is perfectly normal for shortbreads. Transfer to wire racks immediately to cool completely.

7. Store in an airtight container once cooled.

Note: The cookie dough is quite soft, so if using cookie cutter which has intricate features, first cut the cookie shape, then place on the baking tray before pressing on other details. Original recipe used 5cm star-shaped cookie cutter, which makes about 15 cookies.

I am linking this to the Little Thumbs up "Lemon" event organised by Zoe from Bake for Happy Kids and Doreen from My Little Favourite DIY, hosted by Grace from Life can be Simple. You can link your posts here.

I am submitting this to Cook-Your-Books #9 hosted by Joyce of Kitchen Flavours .

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