I’ve made quite a few iced caramel macchiatos with the caramel that I made earlier this week. So good! But I did reserve some of the caramel for these sandwich cookies. These salted caramel shortbread cookies are a new creation that I’d never tried before, I love the way they turned out! The caramel in these cookies gives the crispy shortbread a delicious flaky texture. You can find my easy homemade caramel recipe here.
Salted Caramel Shortbread Cookies
Needed: makes 16-20 sandwich cookies
- 2 sticks butter (room temperature)
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 2 cups flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
- caramel
- coarse salt
In a bowl, combine butter, powdered sugar, flour, baking powder, and vanilla. Stir until well blended. Chill the dough so that it’s easier to work with.
Roll out the dough on a floured surface. Cut out circles in the cookie dough. Use a smaller circle cutter to cut the centers out of half of your dough circles (I used 1″ and 3″ circle cutters).
Transfer your dough cutouts onto a parchment lined baking sheet and bake at 325° for about 10-12 minutes (or until lightly browned). Remove cookies from pan and let cool completely.
Place a small spoonful of caramel onto the bottom of one of the solid cookies and top with a circle cut-out cookie on top. Add more caramel if the top and bottom cookie don’t seal together, use less if caramel oozes out the sides. Sprinkle coarse salt over the caramel.
The caramel should set up a bit more after cookies are assembled.
These go perfectly with coffee or tea!
hello-homebody.com 
Not sure I’d have the patience. I don’t really “do” rolled cookies. But anything with salted caramel is a clear winner in my book!
The dough can also be formed into cookie sticks (I made a few with a bit of leftover dough). Then use the salted caramel as a dip!
Brilliant! That I could handle!
Oh my, those are stunning little cookies! I wouldn’t have guessed that they’re actually very simple as far as ingredients and preparation goes.
They really are simple, I hope you get to try them!
This looks like a great use of leftover caramel. I wish I had one on my table now! These little cookies would go perfect with my cup of tea! Thank you so much for sharing…I’m glad I found your blog tonight!
Using leftover caramel is a great idea! I’m glad you stopped by, thanks for reading!
Oh wow. Shae, this recipe is inspired! I am quite obsessed with salted caramel at the moment and I can imagine how delicious the contrast between the smooth, creamy caramel and the crumbly shortbread biscuit would be. Definitely making these (I’m wondering whether you could put the sandwiched biscuits back in the oven briefly so that the top of the caramel ‘sets’? I can imagine that these biscuits would go everywhere if I tried to transport them – thinking of taking them to a friend’s baby shower – so I might give the setting method a go for ease of transportation!) x
I’m loving salted caramel as well!
I did find that the caramel set-up pretty well overnight (also, these would’ve been better for stacking if I hadn’t over-filled them). Melting down store-bought caramels is another (less delicate) option. :)
I like your idea of popping them in the oven after the cookies are baked! I tried cooking a dough circle with caramel spread on top of it. The caramel didn’t slide off (like I thought it might) but the cookie absorbed some of the caramel and ended up with a softer texture than shortbread.
Maybe if you leave the condensed milk to boil a bit longer it would be easier to sandwich the biscuits. As far as I remember my mum would make it in 3 different versions, depending on the cooking time: one was thinner, the middle one was thicker and you could spread it like dulce de leche, and the thickest one could be cut with a knife.
Thanks for the info! I really wasn’t sure if the caramel would get much thicker. I’ll have to leave it on longer next time.
oooh yum! Want one – or four – right now :)