Can I really call these shortbread cookies? Well yes. The consistency is pretty crumbly, similar to shortbread. The sweetness aspect, however, isn’t much like them at all. Think tea-cakes when you take a bite into this crumbly goodness.
The second you put these in your mouth, it’s hit with a refreshing wave of lemon. Hints of salt might come through before the rosemary finally takes the first strike. When it does, the herbaceousness will fill your mouth for only a moment before the lemon fights back. Balanced fantastically between each other, the lemon and rosemary battle against each other in a vicious war to create a fantastic explosion of flavor in your mouth.
The salt acts as an exchange in the flavor profile that I really can’t get enough of. I’m not the biggest sweet tooth out there, in fact I mostly prefer eating savory dishes, but these have hit the spot for the candy-craver and the meat-muncher.
I’ve been experimenting with different types of almond flour lately. I had stocked up on Bob’s Red Mill almond meal, but I was recommended to try Honeyville Almond Flour. I really have to say that it was one of the best baking recommendations of my keto cooking career that I’ve gotten. It’s so much easier to work with and the final result comes out MUCH better. Almost like real flour, even!
Yields 24 total cookies
The Preparation
- 2 cups almond flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/3 cup stevia/erythritol blend, such as Swerve
- 6 tablespoons butter
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 tablespoon lemon zest
- 4 teaspoons lemon juice
- 2 teaspoons dried rosemary, or fresh
The Execution
1. Gather all your ingredients together. Ignore the egg I have pictured, I was initially planning to add it to the dough if I had to, but it turned out I didn’t.
2. In a large mixing bowl, measure out 2 cups of almond flour, 1/2 tsp. baking powder, and 1/2 tsp. baking soda. Mix these together well.
3. Add 1/3 cup Splenda, or other granulated sweetener to the mixture.
4. Zest your lemon with a microplane until you have 1 Tbsp. lemon zest.
5. Juice half of the lemon to get 4 tsp. of lemon juice.
6. In the microwave, melt 6 Tbsp. of butter. I took me about 20 seconds to do this. Add vanilla extract to this and mix together.
7. Transfer your almond flour and sweetener to a small mixing bowl. Put your butter, lemon zest, lemon juice, and chopped rosemary into the now empty large mixing bowl. Add your almond flour back into the wet mixture slowly, stirring as you go.
8. Keep mixing together the dough until all the almond flour is added.
9. Wrap the dough tightly in plastic wrap. This will be the shape your cookies will be when they’re finished.
10. Place the wrapped dough in the freezer for 30 minutes, or until hard.
11. Preheat your oven to 350F.
12. Remove your dough from the saran wrap, it should look like a log.
13. Cut your dough in ~1/2″ increments with a sharp knife. If this knife isn’t sharp, it will make the dough crumble. If the dough is still crumbling, that means it needs more time in the freezer.
14. Get your cookie sheet out. I use these silicon pads which are nonstick and a huge help when baking.
14. Grease your baking sheet with SALTED butter. This adds a great hint of flavor to the bottom of the cookies.
15. Place your cut cookies onto your baking sheet, you should have about 24 cookies depending on the size.
16. Allow them to cook for 15 minutes, or until golden brown.
17. Allow the cookies to cool for about 10 minutes. After that you can remove them from your cookie sheet and enjoy!
This makes a total of 24 servings of Low-Carb Lemon & Rosemary Shortbread. Each serving comes out to be 81 calories, 7.6g fats, 1g net carbs, and 2g protein.
| NUTRITION | CALORIES | FAT | CARBS | FIBER | NET CARBS | PROTEIN |
| 2 cup almond flour | 1297 | 112 | 49.3 | 29.1 | 20.2 | 47 |
| 1/2 teaspoon baking powder | 1 | 0 | 0.6 | 0 | 0.6 | 0 |
| 1/2 teaspoon baking soda | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 1/3 cup stevia/erythritol blend | 13 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 6 tablespoon butter | 610 | 69 | 0.1 | 0 | 0.1 | 0.7 |
| 1 teaspoon vanilla extract | 12 | 0 | 0.6 | 0 | 0.6 | 0 |
| 1 tablespoon lemon zest | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0.6 | 0.3 | 0.1 |
| 4 teaspoon lemon juice | 3 | 0 | 1.1 | 0.1 | 1 | 0.1 |
| 2 teaspoon dried rosemary | 8 | 0.4 | 1.5 | 1 | 0.5 | 0.1 |
| Totals | 1948 | 181.4 | 54.1 | 30.9 | 23.2 | 48.1 |
| Per Serving (/24) | 81 | 7.6 | 2.3 | 1.3 | 1 | 2 |
Low-Carb Lemon & Rosemary Shortbread
Ingredients
- 2 cup almond flour
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ⅓ cup stevia/erythritol blend such as Swerve
- 6 tablespoon butter
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 tablespoon lemon zest
- 4 teaspoon lemon juice
- 2 teaspoon dried rosemary or fresh
Instructions
- In a large mixing bowl, measure out the almond flour, baking powder, and baking soda. Mix together well.
- Add in the granulated sweetener.
- Melt the butter in the microwave (about 20 seconds). Add in the vanilla extract and mix together.
- Transfer the almond flour mixture to a small mixing bowl. Add the butter, lemon zest, lemon juice, and chopped rosemary to the emptied large mixing bowl. Slowly add the almond flour mixture back in, stirring constantly.
- Keep mixing the dough together until all of the almond flour has been added.
- Shape the dough into a log, then wrap the dough tightly in plastic wrap. Place the wrapped dough in the freezer for 30 minutes, or until hard.
- Preheat oven to 350F. Unwrap the dough. Cut the dough into slices using a sharp knife (a dull knife will cause the dough to crumble). If the dough is still crumbling, it may need to sit in the freezer for a little while longer.
- Grease a cookie sheet with salted butter (this adds a great hint of flavor to the bottom of the cookies). Alternatively, use a Silpat liner. Place the cut cookies onto the baking sheet. Bake for 15 minutes or until golden brown.
- Allow the cookies to cool for about 10 minutes. Remove from the cookie sheet and enjoy!
Sounds good, maybe I’ll make them with lavender or plain. I don’t like rosemary in my sweets.
Megan, they’ll work well without the rosemary but I do suggest toning down the lemon if you are only using lemon. Lavender is something I have never used before but I was actually planning to play around with it in a recipe soon 🙂
Hope you enjoy them though! I’d love to hear how they turn out for you.
How do you think this would fair as a pie crust? Too crumbly?
I think it’d work as a pie crust actually. I have made crusts with similar ingredients. The thing is, you’ll have to par-cook it in the oven, add your fillings, and finish it off in the oven. The moisture from the fillings will normally not make it too crumbly 🙂
Hi Craig,
Thanks for the recipe! My dough is in the freezer now…I can’t wait to sample the finished product!
I had a couple of observations to share with you:
1.) Unless I’m mistaken, you don’t mentioned where/when to add the vanilla extract, baking power, or baking soda, so I just kind of guessed. 🙂
2.) It may be helpful to specifically say at the beginning of the recipe that the wet and dry ingredients should be separated at first. I tend to skim the pictures and go straight to the printable recipe at the end of the post. So, when I was going through the recipe, it would have been helpful at step #1 to say “set aside” or something like that. I didn’t realize until step #4 that they were supposed to be separated. Overall, though, my dough looked like the picture, so I’m sure it’ll end up being fine. Just wanted to comment that I think the instructions could have been a bit clearer.
I love all your fantastic photos and innovative recipes, and visit your site often. Keep up the good work!
Sorry about that Gina! I’ll update the recipe soon to make sure it reflects properly. This one is a little old, so I might not have done as much detail as I do nowadays. I hope you enjoyed them! 🙂
They turned out fantastic! And eating the dough by itself tastes pretty good too. Or…so a friend told me.
Hehe, that’s good 🙂 I updated the post to be a bit more specific with the ingredients, sorry for the confusion!
Just made these wonderful sounding cookies, but mine spread all over the sheet, the mixture taste’s amazing, but not sure what I might have done wrong, help!!!
Hm, possibly the amount of time in the fridge/freezer. If your dough isn’t set enough then it can fall apart when baking. The other option is using different brands than I did when you made the cookies (almond flour, for example).
I changed the flavors up and used orange zest, orange juice and 1 tsp of cinnamon. Love the versatility of this recipie!
This is a great recipe! Forming it as a roll and chilling it worked perfectly. It was nice to not need the egg as a binder. I doubled the amount of zest and lemon juice and it still held its form and moisture. I want to try a cinnamon-ginger variation, or even a turmeric-ginger anti-inflammation cookie! Thank you for working on this recipe and making it available!
No problem at all – thank you for the kind words and feedback! Your turmeric-ginger variation sounds absolutely amazing. If you give it a try, let me know how it turns out!
Well, i did not like these. Not crispy at all. More of a bread texture. The flavor was weak. I used fresh rosemary straight from my garden! Needs way more lemon. Very sad. EXpensive ingredients too.
I’m really sorry to hear you didn’t enjoy them. While I do agree that the lemon could be a bit more prominent, the rosemary definitely isn’t a “punch in your face” flavor with these, as I find it can be too floral.