Sage Cookies

In my not so former (former) life I had to take part in a lot of bake sales.  In the early days more often than not I was the only one who baked anything for the fundraisers so that meant I made a lot of baked goods.  That is when, in about 2001, I discovered an unusual (at the time) recipe for sage cookies in a Christmas cookie magazine.  I tore out the page and have kept it with me ever since.  The sage adds a more grown up feeling to this cookie and it is really much more like a shortbread than what I would consider a cookie as it is not sweet.  It would be great with a cup of tea or even coffee.

Ingredients:

1 3/4 cups all purpose flour

1/3 cup sugar

1/4 cup yellow cornmeal

1/2 cup butter

2 Tablespoons snipped fresh sage

3 Tablespoons milk (I actually had to use a bit more as my dough was too crumbly)

1 egg white (for brushing the cookie)

fresh sage leaves & sugar

Begin by mixing the flour, sugar and cornmeal in a bowl.

Cut in the butter with a pastry cutter.

Add the snipped sage leaves and mix together before adding the milk.  Once combined if your mixture seems too crumbly add a little bit more milk but not too much as this should be somewhat crumbly but combined.  Form the mixture into a ball and knead the dough until it is smooth.  Divide the dough in half.

Roll it out to 1/8 of an inch and cut circle shapes with a glass or cookie cutter.

Brush each round with the egg/water mixture and then add a sage leaf to the top and brush again.  Sprinkle with sugar and bake at 375 f. for 7-10 minutes (just until golden brown).

You can also skip the sage leaf on top and just decorate them how you wish.  Here we used both the sage leaf and some melted lemon chips which we turned into a frosting.  The lemon really complimented the sage.  What we love most is that along with the savory flavor, these little cookies are really quite sweet to look at.