Charlotte Emily
- Dec 25, 2021

Christmas Tree Shortbread

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

These Vegan Shortbread Christmas Trees not only look fab as a centrepiece, but they are really easy and fun to make... who doesn't like decorating the Christmas Tree? Why not make mini edible ones?

With short, 'buttery' biscuits sandwiched between light and airy buttercream, these are a perfect light dessert or snack after a big Christmas Dinner!

Preparation : 30 minutes

Baking Time : 12 – 14 minutes

Makes : 2 larger trees & 1 smaller tree

Ingredients

– For the Shortbread –

200g Plain Flour
100g CornFlour
30g Cacao Powder
200g Dairy-Free Butter
80g Caster Sugar
20g Icing Sugar
1 - 2 tbsp Dairy-Free Milk

– For the Icing –

120g Dairy-Free Butter
600g Icing Sugar (I used 300g regular & 300g salted caramel flavoured from Sugar and Crumbs)
4 tbsp Diary-Free Milk (I used Oat)
A Few Drops of Green Food Colouring

Method

– For the Shortbread –

Preheat the oven to 160C fan and line a baking tray with parchment paper.
Cream the butter and caster sugar (I use a standing mixer on a high speed with a whisk attachment).
Then add the flour, cornflour, icing sugar and cacao powder, mixing until it starts to form a dough; you may need to add 1 tbsp of milk to help the dough start to form. Depending on how the dough looks, you may need to add the second tbsp.
When the mixture has formed a dough, roll it out on a floured surface to around 1/4 inch thick.
Cut out your stars, making sure that you have the same number of each size and then place them on the lined baking tray.
Bake the shortbread for 12 – 14 minutes - the smaller biscuits will be baked before the larger ones, so check after 12 minutes, then leave the larger biscuits for a couple more minutes once the smaller biscuits are out of the oven.
Once out of the oven, transfer them to a rack and leave to cool before decorating (you may want to leave them on the baking tray for a few minutes to harden slightly before moving them, as they will be quite soft whilst they’re hot!)

– For the Icing –

Cream the butter to soften it, then add the icing sugar, whisking until combined (I use a standing mixer on a high speed with a whisk attachment).
Once creamed, add the dairy-free milk (half a tablespoon at a time), food colouring and continue to whisk until all the buttercream is coloured.
To decorate, choose your preferred piping nozzle and fill the piping bag with the buttercream. Then pipe the buttercream onto the shortbread stars, in single ‘dots’. Once the stars are iced, place the larger stars at the bottom and as the tree gets taller, use the smaller stars… once the trees are made, sprinkle with some icing sugar and enjoy!