Salty, Sweet Olive Cookies

I was intrigued by Heidi Swanson's recipe for these Olive Biscuit Cookies from the get go.

Now, I've tasted savoury cookies before and they're a welcome respite from the usual sugary treats. Cheese and spices are nice in a cookie. Olives would be too, I'd imagine. But this recipe, well it is a sweet-savoury combination that's quite unique.

Heidi forewarns her readers that the salty-sweet flavour combination of this cookie (the salty olives + icing sugar dough) may be a turn off. For me, it was quite the opposite. It was a turn on. I was curious as hell.

Now, because I am such an impulsive shopper ("I'll get this, and this, and this. I could use this someday....") I had a jar of olives that had been sitting on the shelf for too long and so this was perfect. And, given my current fascination with cookies, I was off my seat just as soon as I finished reading through her recipe.

I excitedly laid out my cookie kit: damn! I really should invest in more cookie cutters. Mine were limited to a set of fluted round cutters and another set of gingerbread man cutters. Not much of a cookie kit now is it? That's ok. These cookies will be stand out enough because of the flavours and I'll pick up some interesting cutters over the weekend.

Olive cookies
130g unsalted butter, softened
85g icing sugar
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
185g all-purpose flour
55g/1/2 cup pitted black olives, chopped small
2 pinches fine sea salt

Cream butter until soft and fluffy. Stir in the icing sugar until it's well combined. Drizzle the olive oil over and stir it in. Now, using a wooden spoon (it's sturdier than a spatula), gently mix in the flour to form a dough. Add the olives and salt until the olives are distributed kinda evenly throughout the dough.

Shape the dough into a thick disk and place in between two sheets of parchment paper. The dough will be sticky and the paper will make it easier to roll out.

Roll the dough till it's about .5 cm thick. Refrigerate for about 30 mins. The dough is soft and so it needs to be refrigerated to be firm enough to cut.

When you're ready to cut the cookies into shape, pre-heat the oven to 180C.

Cut out your shapes, place on a lined baking sheet and bake each batch for about 12 minutes, rotating midway. If your dough gets soft again mid-way through cutting, pop it in the fridge again for about 15 minutes and continue.