Walnut Shortbreads Filled With Dulce de Leche
Four dozen finished cookies
Dulce de Leche:
3 – 14 oz cans of sweetened condensed milk
Walnut Shortbread:
1 ½ cups walnuts, toasted and coarsely chopped (toss with ½” tsp fine sea salt before toasting)
3 ½ cups all-purpose flour
½ tsp fine sea salt
1 tsp ground ginger
1 ½ cups confectioner’s sugar
Zest of one orange
12 ounces (three sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 tsp vanilla paste
1) Remove the label from the dans of sweetened condensed milk. Place the cans on their sides in a large deep saucepan and add water to come 2” over the cans. Bring the water to a boil over high heat then reduce the heat to medium-low to maintain a bare simmer. Place a lid on the pot and simmer for 3 hours. Remove the pot from the heat and let the cans cool in the water for 4 hours. Open the cans and stir the contents of all three cans to ensure it’s evenly mixed. Store covered in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.
2) Toss the walnuts with ½ tsp fine sea salt and toast/roast until aromatic. Cool completely and coarsely chop.
3) Whisk together the flour, salt and ginger. Set aside. Place the confectioner’s sugar, orange zest, butter and vanilla paste in the bowl of a standing mixer and cream together on low for 5-8 minutes. Add the chopped walnuts and the dry mix and mix together just until a dough forms. Set aside the dough to rest for 30 minutes while the oven preheats.
4) Preheat your oven to 325 degrees and line 3 baking sheets with parchment paper.
5) Roll ½ of the dough on a lightly floured surface to ¼” thickness. Cut into 1 ½” circles and place them on the baking sheets about 1” apart. Gather the scraps and cut circles again. Do the same with second ½ of the dough. Chill the cookies on the sheet for about 10 minutes before baking.
6) Bake the cookies, one sheet at a time, for 6 minutes, rotate the pan, and bake for another 6 minutes, just until the edges are beginning to brown. Cool the cookies on the tray for 5 minutes and then let cool completely on a wire rack.
7) Once completely cooled, sandwich two cookies together with 1 tsp of the dulce de leche. If desired, dust the top of the cookies with additional confectioner’s sugar.
