Strawberry Shortbread and Cream

A splash of sweet vermouth in the strawberries takes them over the top.

I've never liked the soggy texture of strawberry shortcake, or tres leches cake for that matter, so I'm saving this recipe. I cut up and sugared some strawberries this afternoon and dolloped whipped cream on top for dessert. Now I wish I'd thought to serve it with some Maria cookies (which I always have on hand because they are not sickeningly sweet like many American cookies). I like to add a pinch of salt and a good grind of black pepper to the strawberries, too. Thanks, Melissa!

Try substituting the fruit sugar with up-to a tablespoon of strawberry jam. It will sweeten the fruit and make a sauce.

Great recipe - just a couple of notes: the shortbread cookies can burn quite easily so keep a close eye on them, the salt is better distributed throughout the dough if it's added to the flour instead of the wet ingredients, I froze the dough and it turned out fine and needed less time to chill, the whipped cream needs a touch of sugar otherwise it's a little heavy Thanks for the recipe!

Why don’t commenters just stick to the recipe at hand? Enough with the snarky comments that strawberry shortcake is the ONLY way to go. How about trying something new? You might end up liking, even preferring it.

You could try yogurt, non-dairy yogurt or silken tofu. (1/4 cup per yolk). Other less ‘pAntry staple’ solutions include chickpea flour or lecithin.

These were delicious! Made for just the two of us, and the recipe left us with enough dough to cut off half and freeze for later. Our oven temp varies a bit from front to back - having a few that were slightly browner than others was pretty tasty as well. Would make again!

I put cut up hot dogs on top like the recipe suggested and they tasted terrible. Avoid that last step unless you really like hot dogs.

These cookies provide an approach to shortcakes. Biscuits are an alternative, but real shortcakes for strawberrys have been defined for a decade by the James Beard version available in the NYT most recently perfected slighly by Larry Forgione. The recipe should be followed exactly; working the cream in slowly with your hands is a key.

I froze it to decrease the chill time and the shortbread cookies turned out fine for me

I splashed the strawberries with balsamic vinegar to cut the sweetness. Delicious!

Made Melissa’s Strawberry Shortcake with Lemon-Pepper Syrup last night, which I prefer to this recipe. Depends on what you think of as the proper way to make this dessert. In New England, it must be biscuits with the berries/cream on top. My mother always made a lemon-vanilla sponge cake and layered the berries and cream, and that’s what I do. But both of Melissa’s recipes use pepper- a surprising but fantastically subtle addition.

A perfect butter cookie. I added pressed edible flowers from the garden and rolled them on the tops of each cookie beneath a piece of wax paper before I baked them. Beautiful and delicious.

I freeze shortbread dough all the time. No need to defrost as long as you can get a knife in it.