Shamrock Cookies: easy St. Patrick’s Day treats you’ll want to make
These adorable shamrock cookies, made with a buttery matcha vanilla shortbread dough are the easy slice and bake cookie you need for St. Patrick’s.
I’m always preaching about how much better it is to do the decoration part of baking, and slice and bake cookies are one of my favorite ways to do just that. Tint the dough with matcha powder, spend a couple minutes shaping the shamrocks and rolling out the vanilla dough, and after a chill, you’ll have 4 dozen sweet little shamrock cookies ready to bake whenever you feel like it.
| Active time | Total time | Yield | Difficulty |
| 20 min | 1 hr 24 min | 48 cookies | Easy |
Why you should give these shamrock cookies a go for St. Patrick’s this year
- Buttery goodness: Shortbread is always good in its perfect simplicity. Butter crisp edges lightly sweetened always makes for a good cookie. You’ll level up your Irish points and flavor in the cookie if you use Irish butter in these!
- Fun to make: Rolling out the ropes of matcha dough for the shamrocks is fun to do on its own, but when you make the first slice and see the shamrocks inside your dough log? That is too cool and something worth making with your kids for the “wow” moment.
- 5 ingredients: There’s 5 ingredients here, and outside of the matcha, you probably already have everything. These truly are simple.
- Shortbread is popular in Ireland: Shortbread, made of just butter, sugar, and flour is a very traditional cookie from Scotland, though it has been popular with their Irish neighbors for centuries. Here we add a little vanilla for flavor and matcha for color, but otherwise, this is a great cookie to go with afternoon tea just as shortbread fingers are.
Ingredients for Shamrock Sugar Cookies
Cookie dough
- Butter
- Powdered sugar
- Vanilla extract
- All-purpose flour
- Matcha powder (ceremonial grade has the brightest color) or green food coloring
Equipment needed
- Sheet trays
- Parchment
- Plastic wrap
- Rolling pin
- 2 empty paper towel rolls
- rubberbands
Matcha vs. green food coloring
In general, I try to avoid using artificial dyes in my baking. There are times that that’s difficult, but in the case of green, we have one of the best natural colorings ever in matcha.
Matcha doesn’t lose color when you bake it, plus it has an earthy grassy flavor that compliments vanilla and strawberry very well. That flavor combo might not be obvious, but once you’ve tasted it, you understand. If that peaks your curiosity, try my Strawberry Matcha ice cream or my Strawberry Matcha shortbread fingers.
You can absolutely use green food coloring for the shamrocks in this recipe; they will just lack some of the depth of flavor you get from the matcha version.
How to make shamrock cookies
- Make the vanilla dough: Beat the butter and sugar until smooth. Add in the vanilla and flour just until the flour disappears. Scrape the bowl and then dump the dough onto a piece of plastic wrap. Fold the plastic over the dough to smooth any crumbs back into the dough and any butter that didn’t get incorporated well.
- Make the matcha dough: Divide the dough roughly in half. Place one half back in the mixer bowl and beat in the matcha powder for a couple seconds. Scrape the green dough onto another piece of plastic. Use the plastic wrap to fold the dough over itself a couple times to distribute the color evenly as best as you can.
- Form the shamrocks: Divide the green dough into 6-8 parts, depending on if you want to make 3 leaf shamrocks or 4 leaf clovers. Roll each portion into a long rope about 13″ long. Stack 2 logs right next to each other on a parchment -lined baking sheet, pressing them to adhere the dough. Place 1 (or 2 for 4 leaf clovers) in the center of the other logs to form the shamrock. Repeat this process for the remaining green pieces of dough. Freeze the dough for 20 minutes.
- Roll out the vanilla dough: Divide the vanilla dough in half. Roll each piece on a piece of plastic into a 13″ long rope. Press down on the rope to flatten it lightly, trying not to make it longer, just wider. Cover the dough with another piece of plastic and roll it into a flat narrow rectangle. You can leave this dough out while the shamrock logs are chilling.
- Finish the cookie logs: After the shamrock logs are firm, place one in the center of one of the vanilla pieces. Wrap the dough around the green. If you don’t have enough width to completely cover the green, take off the green log and roll the vanilla dough a little wider to cover. Wrap the vanilla dough completely around the green, smoothing it in place. Repeat with the second dough log.
- Wrap the logs: Wrap the dough logs in plastic, then roll it on the counter to round the edges. Cut open a paper towel tube. Place the dough log inside the tube, wrapping the cardboard around the dough. Roll the dough on the counter a few times to continue to round the edges of the cookie log slightly.
- Chill: Freeze the dough logs for 20 more minutes.
- Slice and bake: Cut slices of the dough (about 24 per log) and bake them on parchment -lined baking sheets at 350 F (180 C) for 12 minutes.
Tricks for making the best shortbread cookies
- Press the dough together: It is important that shortbread is mixed well without overworking the dough since there are no eggs to bind the dough together. To do this, mix in the flour, just until it disappears. Dump the dough into a piece of plastic wrap and use the wrap to fold the dough back on itself, hydrating any dry spots and smoothing out any stray pieces of butter. This will make a cohesive dough that will be easy to roll without overworking it.
- Dry fit the vanilla dough: Before you start smoothing the vanilla dough around the green dough, be sure to double check if it is wide enough. Lightly place the green dough in the middle of the rolled out vanilla dough. If it’s not wide enough, remove the green log and roll the dough a little wider to fit.
- Use a ruler if you’d like: If you don’t trust yourself to cut even slices from the dough log, pull out a clear ruler. A 3/8″ slice will make a nice size cookie. You can make ticks along the top of the log with your knife and ruler and cut from there.
- Cut cold dough only: Make sure that the dough is very cold. 20 minutes in the freezer after completing the logs will be perfect. If the dough is too warm, the shamrock design will get squashed when you cut the cookies.
More slice and bake cookies to try
Shamrock Shortbread Cookies
- Total Time: 84 minutes
- Yield: 48 cookies 1x
- Diet: Vegetarian
Description
An easy slice and bake cookie with vivid green matcha flavored shamrocks on the inside of the buttery vanilla dough. These bake up into delightfully crisp cookies perfect for snacking, preferably with a hot cup of black tea.
Ingredients
Scale
Matcha vanilla shortbread dough
- 2 sticks butter at room temperature (227 g), preferably unsalted
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar (60 g)
- 2 teaspoons vanilla paste or vanilla extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (260 g)
- 2 teaspoons matcha green tea powder (see note)
Equipment
- 1/2 sheet pans
- parchment
- plastic wrap
Instructions
Make the dough logs
- Make the vanilla dough: Beat the butter and sugar until smooth. Add in the vanilla and flour just until the flour disappears. Scrape the bowl and then dump the dough onto a piece of plastic wrap. Use the plastic to fold the dough over on itself to smooth any crumbs back into the dough and any butter that didn’t get incorporated well.
- Make the matcha dough: Divide the dough roughly in half. Place one half back in the mixer bowl and beat in the matcha powder for a couple seconds. Scrape the green dough onto another piece of plastic. Use the plastic wrap to fold the dough over itself a couple times to distribute the color evenly as best as you can.
- Form the shamrocks: Divide the green dough into 6-8 parts, depending on if you want to make 3-leaf shamrocks or 4-leaf clovers. Roll each portion into a long rope about 13″ long. Stack 2 logs right next to each other on a parchment-lined baking sheet, pressing them to adhere the dough. Place 1 (or 2 for 4-leaf clovers) in the center of the other logs to form the shamrock. Repeat this process for the remaining green pieces of dough. Freeze the dough for 20 minutes.
- Roll out the vanilla dough: Divide the vanilla dough in half. Roll each piece on a piece of plastic into a 13″ long rope. Press down on the rope to flatten it lightly, trying not to make it longer, just wider. Cover the dough with another piece of plastic and roll it into a flat narrow rectangle. You can leave this dough out while the shamrock logs are chilling.
- Finish the cookie logs: After the shamrock logs are firm, place one in the center of one of the vanilla pieces. Wrap the dough around the green. If you don’t have enough width to completely cover the green, take off the green log and roll the vanilla dough a little wider to cover. Wrap the vanilla dough completely around the green, smoothing it in place. Repeat with the second dough log.
- Wrap the logs: Wrap the dough logs in plastic, then roll it on the counter to round the edges. Cut open a paper towel tube. Place the dough log inside the tube, wrapping the cardboard around the dough. Roll the dough on the counter a few times to continue to round the edges of the cookie log slightly.
- Chill: Freeze the dough logs for 20 more minutes.
Roll each portion into a long rope about 13″ long. Stack 2 logs right next to each other on a parchment-lined baking sheet, pressing them to adhere the dough. Place 1 (or 2 for 4-leaf clovers) in the center of the other logs to form the shamrock. Repeat this process for the remaining green pieces of dough. Freeze the dough for 20 minutes. 
Baking the cookies
- Close to the end of the chilling time, preheat the oven to 350 F (180 C). Line 2 sheet trays with parchment.
- Slice and bake: Cut slices of the dough (about 24 per log) and bake them for 12 minutes, rotating the sheets 180 degrees halfway through baking. It’s best to bake just one sheet at a time here. Let the cookies cool on the sheet trays.
- Cookies will stay fresh in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 1 week. You can freeze them for up to 2 months.
- The unbaked dough logs can also be frozen for up to 2 months. To bake the cookies from frozen logs, sit the logs on the counter for 5-10 minutes. Cut the cookies and bake as normal.
Notes
On matcha: There are several different types of matcha you can get. Ceremonial grade has the brightest green color. Culinary matcha is much muddier in color, but it tastes just fine. You could also use matcha latte powder , which I will sometimes get when I can’t find my favorite matcha. It works great here too!
- Prep Time: 20
- + 40 minutes chilling time:
- Cook Time: 24 minutes
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
