Crispy Scottish Shortbread

Name: Crispy Scottish Shortbread
Yield: 16 sticks
Cuisine: United Kingdom
Ingredients: 180 g all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled; 77 g white rice flour, spooned and leveled (not glutinous rice flour); 100 g granulated sugar; 1.5 g fine sea salt (leave out with salted butter); 227 g unsalted butter, cold, cut into about 16 pieces

Also called Scottish shortbread, shortbread fingers

Crisp, sandy shortbread sticks made with rice flour and cold butter, cut partway through the bake and dried in the cooling oven.

Makes: 16 sticks

Cookies Make ahead

From Jennifer Maloney, Seasons and Suppers

Ingredients

Scale

Amounts are for the recipe. Sizes, times and temperatures in the method are not scaled.

180 g1½ cupsall-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
77 g½ cupwhite rice flour, spooned and leveled (not glutinous rice flour)
100 g½ cupgranulated sugar
1.5 g¼ tspfine sea salt (leave out with salted butter)
227 g1 cupunsalted butter, cold, cut into about 16 pieces

Amounts worked out from the other system are rounded.

Method

Heat the oven to 350°F, conventional with no fan, with the rack in the center. Line an 8-inch square metal pan with parchment, leaving about 1 inch of overhang.
In a stand mixer with the paddle, combine the all-purpose flour (180 g1½ cups), rice flour (77 g½ cup), sugar (100 g½ cup) and salt (1.5 g¼ tsp). Add the butter (227 g1 cup) and mix on low for several minutes, until the butter is in small, even pieces. The mixture should look sandy but clump when squeezed.
Tip it into the pan and press it down firmly and evenly.
Bake about 35 minutes, until set with no browning at the edges; closer to 40 minutes if the dough was moist.
Take the pan out and leave the oven on. Rest 10 minutes, then cut into 16 sticks about 1 inch by 4 inches. Prick each stick twice with a fork, down to the bottom of the pan.
Lift the slab out by the parchment onto a baking sheet. Ease the sticks apart with a fork, leaving small gaps, and press any broken pieces back together.
Return the sheet to the oven and turn the oven off at once. Leave 30 minutes for pale and lightly crisp, or up to 45 minutes for crisper and lightly golden.
Cool completely on a rack.

Notes

Butter. Unsalted, high-fat butter, about 84%, is best. Quality matters here.
Dough. If it is sticky, add a little flour. If it won't clump, add water about 1 tsp at a time.
Substitutions. Cornstarch can replace the rice flour, but the cookies come out less crisp. Half the sugar can be superfine.
Glass pan. Lower the oven by 25°F and watch the last minutes.
The sticks are fragile. For gifts, cut smaller pieces or squares.
Keeps several weeks in an airtight container at room temperature, and improves with time.