Fill your home with the relaxing scent of lavender with delicious shortbread cookies and local lavender buds!

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Any shortbread cookie recipe would work. We will have Susan’s Vanilla Extract and Culinary Lavender on the menu this weekend so you can stock up! The lavender buds come to us from Lisa at Little Herb House Farm, just outside of Raleigh.
Lisa has been kind enough to invite the ENTIRE membership out to her gorgeous farm for a Spring Harvest Hoedown on Sunday, May 3rd! Get tickets on the menu this weekend! $5 per car, with a portion of the proceeds going to Abundance Foundation, a great organization that does work with sustainability and fiscal sponsorship of community efforts around the state including Farm to Fork events, emerging food markets and more!
Fun activities will include games for the kids, an inflatable slide and dancing! Fire Chef Food Truck will be there with fire hats for the kids and Chef Kevin will be manning the truck, cooking our farmer’s produce with artisan accoutrements! There will be artisan goods to taste and buy directly including Delight Soy snacks, Cheshire’s pork products and ROOTS hummus. Lisa will have plants for sale, just in time for Spring planting!
For more information about Little Herb House, visit the website: http://www.littleherbhouse.com/

Lavender Shortbread Cookies with Lemon Buttercream Frosting

The Lavender Lover’s Handbook (Timber Press, 2012) by Sarah Berringer Bader
• 1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) butter (not margarine), room temperature
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 2 teaspoons dried culinary lavender buds, chopped
• 2 1/3 cups flour
• 1/2 cup cornstarch
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
MAKES ABOUT 2 DOZEN LAVENDER SHORTBREAD COOKIES
Lemon Buttercream Frosting:
• 1/3 cup softened butter
• 1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
• 3 cups powdered sugar, sifted
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• Dried lavender buds, for topping
1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Cover 2 baking sheets with parchment or brown paper.
2. In a large bowl with an electric mixer, cream together butter, sugar and lavender until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add flour, cornstarch and salt; beat until combined.
3. Divide the dough in half. Flatten it into squares and wrap it in plastic. Chill in the refrigerator until firm, approximately 1 hour.
4. On a floured board, roll or pat out each square to a thickness of 3/8 inch. Cut the dough into 1 1/2-inch rounds or into a shape of your choice with a cookie cutter.
5. Transfer cookies to prepared baking sheets, spacing the cookies about 1 inch apart. Prick each cookie several times with the tines of a fork. Bake 20 to 25 minutes until pale golden (do not brown). Cool slightly, then transfer to a rack. Allow shortbread cookies to cool.
6. To make the frosting, cream together softened butter and lemon zest. Begin adding small amounts of the sugar and the lemon juice, mixing well before adding more.
7. Spread the frosting on the cooled cookies. Before frosting hardens, sprinkle dried lavender buds on top of each cookie.

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