Day 3 of my 7 days of holiday cookies brings us these unbelievable slice and bake chocolate chunk pecan shortbread cookies. There are a lot of recipes for slice n’ bake cookies out there, but these are truly the best, And I don’t say that lightly. Not only are they super buttery, but they are studded with tons of toasted pecans and chopped chocolate and rolled in turbinado sugar for a gorgeous texture. And just to make them extra, I dipped them in more melted chocolate and topped them with more toasted pecans and some really flaky sea salt. These are perfect for holiday gifts because the recipe can easily be doubled or tripled. Add this super easy and delicious cooking to your holiday baking rotation!
TIPS FOR BAKING SLICE + BAKE PECAN SHORTBREAD COOKIES
The really important thing about this recipe is to make sure that you are adequately chilling the dough. It needs to be very cold so that the cookies don’t spread all over the place. The cookie dough doesn’t actually contain any egg and it has tons of butter, so again, COLD COLD COLD.
While it’s not necessary to roll the cookie logs in turbinado, raw, or sanding sugar, it really gives the cookies such awesome texture and crunch on the outside and it makes them so pretty!
Use a serrated knife to cut the cookie dough logs into rounds, it will make your life so much easier!
slice + bake chocolate chunk pecan shortbread cookies
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Total Time: 25 minutes
- Yield: 18-20 cookies 1x
- Category: cookies
- Diet: Vegetarian
Description
These are the ultimate shortbread cookies! Loaded with tons of chocolate and toasted pecans and then dipped in more chocolate, what more could you ask for?
Ingredients
- 2 sticks (8 oz) good quality unsalted butter, diced and cold
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
- 1 cup chopped, toasted pecans (unsalted), plus more for sprinkling
- 4 oz chopped dark chocolate or chocolate chunks
- pinch of kosher salt
- 1 egg, beaten
- turbinado or sanding sugar
- 6 oz dark chocolate, melted
- flaky sea salt, for sprinkling
Instructions
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the cold butter and sugars together until fluffy, about 4 minutes or so. Add the vanilla and beat for 30 seconds. Add the flour, kosher salt, pecans, and chocolate. Beat until the dough clumps together, about 2 minutes or so. Divide the dough into two equal portions, roll into logs about 2 1/2 inches thick and 6-7 inches long, and wrap tightly with plastic wrap. Chill logs in the fridge for 2 hours.
- Preheat an oven to 350 degrees F and line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Brush the outside of the logs with the beaten egg and roll in the coarse sugar until well coated. Slice the shortbread into rounds just under 1/2″ thick with a serrated knife. If the dough breaks apart, just press it back together. Place the cookies on the prepared baking sheets and bake for 15 minutes, until just barely golden brown. Cool to room temperature and then dip the cooled cookies in the melted chocolate. Sprinkle the top with flaky sea salt and more chopped pecans.
Notes
Please don’t use chocolate chips for this! I always buy the giant bars of bittersweet chocolate from Trader Joe’s and roughly chop the chocolate. Alternately, you could just buy a couple of bars of chocolate and chop them.
I used a mixture of sanding sugar and turbinado sugar to roll the cookies in and the texture was amazing!
With so few ingredients, use the best quality possible.
For the toasted pecans, I bought raw pecan halves and toasted them in a 350 degree oven for 8 minutes. Once cool, I threw them into a ziplock bag and just smashed them a bit with a rolling pin. This yields nice sized pieces.
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