Short Break followed by Short Bread

I am officially moved in...

Potentially worse for the ware,

Definitely bruised head to toe,

With new incredible tinkering and carpentry skills,

But still, all of my necessary belongings have been moved from my parents' home to my new oh-so-loverly apartment with B (for her name and 'best'...direct quote, mind you), my many atimes aforementioned cousin.

In honor of our new found roommate-ness, we decided to celebrate with some serious bonding time because clearly the past 24 years of it haven't been enough.

We talked, and dinnered, and patio-ed, and movied, and perhaps most successfully and definitely most blog-relevant, we baked.

We baked almond shortbread.

And it was glorious.

seriously rogue pictures but I didn't want to miss the movie

New Apartment Shortbread
Servings: 6 healthy-sized cookies

Ingredients

1 cup flour
1/4 cup sugar
pinch of salt
1 stick/8 tablespoons cool but not hard butter, cut into 8 pieces
* optional - slivered almonds

To Do

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

combine flour, sugar, and salt.

You may use a number of methods to add in the butter - food process until marble and rice sized clumps form, cut with pastry cutter, use two forks, etc. Whatever floats your boat and doesn't overwork your pastry.

Pour crumbs into baking dish - pyrex, bread pan, springform that is very well lubricated with oil, butter, or spray.

Gently press down evenly and sprinkle with slivered almonds.

Cook in oven for anywhere between 40 minutes and an hour. This is heavily dependent on the size of your baking dish, the thickness of the shortbread and the humidity in the air. Just be sure to check it out at 40 minutes and look for an almond brown color.

Take out of oven and immediately slice and remove from dish.

Enjoy!

Taste Notes

This shortbread is crumbly and incredibly moist.

It's a great basic to put your own spin on too. Feel free to add chocolate chips, dried fruit, or substitute any nut as well.

Stream of Thought

What was the first thing you baked or cooked in your new digs?

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