Chocolate Dipped Shortbread with Hazelnuts
Crumbly, buttery, crispy, and naturally sweetened with honey, these dark chocolate dipped shortbread biscuits topped with roasted hazelnuts will be your new favourite tea time treat! This recipe is super easy to make and uses only 6 ingredients you likely have on hand.
The best chocolate dipped shortbread biscuits ever
If there’s one cookie I can never say no to, it’s a crumbly, melt-in-your-mouth, all-butter shortbread biscuit. So it was only a matter of time before I created a recipe for refined sugar free shortbread and I am stoked to be sharing it with you today.
We’re using honey to sweeten the dough for these chocolate dipped shortbread and I love the subtle floral flavour it gives them. Paired with the dark chocolate and hazelnuts, this is a dream combo!
This smaller-batch recipe uses only 6 ingredients and makes just 18 biscuits; it’s the perfect holiday baking treat for two or really any time you’re craving a shortbread biscuit.
Ingredients in this recipe
- Plain flour: Provides structure to our biscuits.
- Sea salt: A little salt is necessary to season the dough and pairs well with the chocolate.
- Unsalted butter: Butter provides the crumbly texture of these cookies and makes them melt in your mouth.
- Honey: Our natural sweetener of choice for this recipe.
- Dark chocolate: It would be difficult to make chocolate dipped shortbread without the chocolate!
- Roasted hazelnuts: The perfect partner to the dark chocolate.
How to make Chocolate Dipped Shortbread
When I say that this is an easy shortbread recipe, I’m not joking! Here’s how to do it:
- Whisk together the dry ingredients.
- Cream together the butter and honey.
- Pulse in the dry ingredients until crumbly.
- Bring the dough together, shape into a disc, and chill.
- Roll the dough out and cut out your biscuit shapes.
- Chill the shapes on a baking tray.
- Bake. Dip. Enjoy!
Full details are in the recipe card at the end of this post.
What chocolate should I use for dipping?
Only use high-quality chocolate for dipping. Ideally, you want one with a higher cocoa butter to cocoa ratio as this will help it melt more smoothly.
However, you can use any quality chocolate for dipping. If you have one with a higher cocoa ratio, just mix in a little oil when you’re melting it to keep it from drying out quickly or hardening while you’re mid-dunk.
How to dip biscuits in chocolate perfectly
There are three things to keep in mind when you’re dipping biscuits in chocolate:
- Dip while the chocolate is warm. If you wait too long to start dipping after melting your chocolate, the chocolate will start to harden and has the potential to seize. It’s best to melt it right before you want to dip your cookies.
- Allow excess chocolate to drizzle off. Before placing your dipped cookie down, let the excess drizzle off by holding it above the chocolate bowl for a few seconds. This will ensure you don’t have a pool of hardened chocolate on the bottom of your biscuit once it cools.
- Let the chocolate dipped shortbread sit at room temperature to harden. Putting them in the fridge will make the chocolate turn a bit grey. If you can, let them sit at room temperature to harden so the chocolate retains its shine and colour.
Can chocolate dipped cookies be frozen?
Yes! You can definitely freeze chocolate dipped cookies. Wait until they have set completely and then freeze them in an airtight container between layers of parchment so they don’t stick together. They should keep for up to 3 months.
Tips for making this recipe perfectly
- Use a neutral or light flavoured honey. Dark or strongly flavoured honeys will come through in the flavour of the biscuits. For the most authentic flavour, be sure to use a mild tasting honey.
- Don’t mix your flour into the wet ingredients, pulse it in. If you have a pulse setting on your hand mixer, use it! You only want to mix the dry ingredients into the wet until rough crumbles form.
- Work the dough as little as possible. Overworking the dough will develop the gluten in the flour and result in tough cookies. Knead as little as possible and try and only roll the dough out once or twice.
- Don’t skip the second chill. Because we’re using a liquid sweetener in these chocolate dipped shortbread, the second chill solidifies the butter and prevents the biscuits from spreading too much in the oven.
- Watch them like a hawk while they bake. Naturally sweetened baked goods brown and burn quickly, so be sure not to do laundry or have a shower during the 10 minutes these cookies are in the oven!
- Can’t do hazelnuts? That’s cool, choose your favourite! These biscuits would be delicious with almonds, peanuts, or even pecans.
Looking for more refined sugar free biscuits and cookies?
Chewy Chocolate Chai Cookies
Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
No Bake Peanut Butter Cookies
Cranberry Almond Breakfast Cookies
Christmas Sugar Cookies
Cinnamon Espresso Oatmeal Cookies
Apple Crumble Cookies
Apricot and Hazelnut Cookies
The Best Natural Peanut Butter Cookies
If you make this recipe, let me know by snapping a picture and tagging me on Instagram @naturallysweet_kitchen. I love seeing your creations and sharing them in my Stories. Or let me know you love this Chocolate Dipped Shortbread recipe by leaving a comment and rating below!
Chocolate Dipped Shortbread with Hazelnuts
These dark chocolate dipped shortbread biscuits topped with roasted hazelnuts are crumbly, buttery, crispy, and naturally sweetened with honey.
Ingredients
- 125 g plain flour
- ¼ tsp fine sea salt
- 100 g unsalted butter, room temperature
- 50 g unpasteurised honey
- 100 g dark chocolate, melted
- 30 g roasted hazelnuts, finely chopped
Method
- In a small bowl, whisk together the flour and salt. Set aside.
- Add the butter and honey to a medium bowl and beat with a hand mixer until pale and fluffy.
- Add the dry ingredients to the creamed butter and honey and pulse to combine until the mixture just comes together. It should resemble rough breadcrumbs; do not overmix.
- Bring the dough together in the bowl using floured hands and then tip it out onto a lightly floured surface. Gently knead the dough just until it comes together and then pack it into a disc shape. Wrap the disc in parchment paper or cling film and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Flour a work surface and rolling pin and then roll the dough out to a 3.5mm thickness (about the thickness of a pound coin). Chomp out biscuits using a cutter and place them on a baking sheet lined with a silicone mat or non-stick paper. They do not have to be very far apart as these biscuits don’t spread much in the oven. Place the baking tray of biscuits in the fridge and chill for 15 minutes.
- While the biscuits chill, preheat the oven to 180ºC (350ºF). Once chilled, bake the biscuits for 8-11 minutes or until slightly golden. Remove them from the oven and allow them to cool on the tray for 5 minutes then place them on a wire rack to finish cooling completely.
- Once the biscuits are cooled, dip each one into the melted chocolate and allow any excess chocolate to drizzle off. Sprinkle the chocolate coated halves with the chopped hazelnuts. Allow the chocolate to harden before serving (about 12 hours at room temperature or 30 minutes in the fridge).
Notes
These biscuits will keep sealed in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days. Do not store with any other baked goods or they will soften.
