Fig Cookies – 12 Days of Cookies
December 5, 2008 by Andrea 
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Filed under Dessert, Holidays
Day 5 of our 12 Days of Cookies extravaganza thing, and I chose to make fig shortbread cookies from 1964. They don’t look like much, but I think they have a perfect shortbread texture, slightly dry and crumbly, and they have pecans, one of my favorite nuts. The figs are ground up in the food processor and added with the flour, and I was very pleased with the flavor of the pecans and figs together. Plus they get bonus points for being easy, so I count these as a winner. Top Gun helped me make the dough, and for his effort he was allowed to swipe a few dried figs, which he promptly devoured.
I think butter is the key ingredient in shortbread: use the best you can afford and keep it chilled. You want the butter to be cold when you cream it with the sugar, and you want it to be cold when you shape the cookies, otherwise the cookies will just spread and lose their texture when baking. I made the dough then let it rest in the frig for about 30 minutes while I performed my mommy taxi duties, the put the bowl back in the frig between shaping batches. Mine did not turn out flat like the Gourmet version, but I like how they look.
Be sure to visit all our friends in the cookie clan to see what cookies they chose as well as the Gourmet website to see all their favorite cookies from 1941-2008.
The Rest of the Cookie Baking Clan
Sandy of The Bakers Bench
Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Judy of No Fear Entertaining
Jerry of Cooking By the Seat of My Pants
FIG COOKIES (SHORTBREAD)
Equipment
stand mixer with paddle attachment
baking sheet buttered or lined with parchment
food processor
Ingredients
1 cup (2 sticks/225 g) unsalted butter, cold
1/4 cup (44 g) granulated sugar
1 cup (100 g) pecans, ground
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups (240 g) unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup (160 g) ground dried figs (finely chop in the food processor)
Preparation
1. Preheat the oven to 300° F/150° C.
2. In the bowl of the stand mixer, cream together the cold butter and sugar until it’s fluffy.
3. Stir in the vanilla and ground pecans until the pecans are distributed evenly.
4. Mix together the flour and dried figs and add to the creamed mixture on low speed. Finish with the spatula, folding in until you don’t see any white flour specks. Chill the dough for about 30 minutes.
5. Shape the dough into small fingers and place on the prepared baking sheet.
6. Bake the cookies for 25 to 30 minutes. Don’t let them get too brown. Remove from the oven and let them sit on the baking sheet for a minute or two, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
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Source: adapted from Gourmet
These look so good. Wish I could share these with my mom who was wild about figs!
I love figs and shortbread so this is perfect. They look very elegant.
I love, love, love figs. So I’m all over this recipe, Andrea!
I like how these ones look too! I like that they are more shaped than their’s are!
The shape of these is quite beautiful. I love shortbread, so know they’re quite tasty, too. I’m trying to get my tastebuds around the figs in them, though. The only cookies I’ve had figs in are Fig Newtons!