Mandira: I stumbled over this recipe on Baking Bites and it tried it out. Since it was a success, I am sharing it with all of you here. I tweaked the recipe a bit.

 

Lakshmi: This recipe is similar to the short bread recipe we use in our family – minus the egg. The guava paste called for in the original recipe at Baking Bites  went fabulously with the shortbread. 

Ingredients:

• 3 cups all purpose flour (if you’re skipping the 1 egg used in this recipe use 2 3/4 cups of flour)
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder 
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 cup butter, softened
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 1 tbsp orange zest
• 1 large egg 
• 1 tbsp orange juice
• Guava Paste/Jam 
  

Method:

• Preheat oven to 350F. Grease or Line a baking tray. 
• Whisk together flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt.
• Cream together butter and sugar until light. Beat in orange zest and egg followed by the orange juice.
• Gradually beat in the flour mixture, scraping down the sides of the bowl as you work, until dough comes together.
• Divide dough into three portions and work with each one individually.
• Place the dough on a lightly floured surface and roll out to be 1/3 inch thick. Add more sprinkles of flour as you work to keep the dough from sticking. Use a lightly floured 2-inch round cutter to cut out circles of dough. Place on prepared baking sheet.
• Top each cookie with a piece of guava paste. 
• Repeat with remaining cookie dough. Bake for 13-16 minutes until cookies are  golden at the edges.
• Cool on baking tray for 4-5 minutes and then transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Source: Original recipe here.

Lakshmi’s Notes: Baking times will vary with oven, mine took just 11 minutes for cookies to turn golden at 220 C.  I skipped the salt completely. I skipped the egg and to compensate reduced the flour by 1/4 cup. I generally rest by dough overnight before baking, so I shaped the cookies and rested them overnight before baking.  

Mandira’s notes: I skipped the rum that the original recipe asked for and I dint dust the cookies with sugar before serving. We are not much of a jam family.  We have had a bottle of marmalade lying in the fridge for ages. Some of it got used in these cookies.  Mixed fruit jam or any other jam would work just as well.  A brighter colour jam(like mixed fruit) may even make the cookies look more attractive than the dull orange marmalade. I used Amul butter and skipped the addition of salt. I love the smell of fresh zest. I didnt have oranges at home but I did have sweet limes(mausambis). I used the zest of the sweet lime and to me it tasted just as good as orange zest.