Guest: Madeline Iva

The beautiful and charming Madeline Iva is my guest today. She's sharing her own recipe for heart shaped cookies called LINZER HEARTS.

Please be respectful of this personal recipe. If you share it, please be sure to credit the generous Madeline Iva! And if you make these cookies, please share your results with us in the comments!

LINZER HEART COOKIES, image and recipe (c) Madeline Iva

LINZER HEARTS
(recipe copyright, Madeline Iva)

I made these cookies for my then-boyfriend now-husband on our first Valentine's Day together. :)
They are delicate and melt in your mouth, so take care when baking.  Surprise! This recipe is vegan. But I swear you won't be able to tell...

Ingredients

3/4 lb. Earth Balance (or margarine)
1 3/4 C confectioner's sugar
2 C flour
1 C arrowroot power
2 C shelled walnuts, processed until small crumbles
1 C red raspberry preserves

You will need a large heart and a small heart cookie cutters for the cookies.

Method

    * Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

    * Cream the Earth Balance and 1 cup of sugar until light and fluffy, add 1/2 C raspberry preserves.

    * Add flour, arrowroot powder, and walnuts and blend -- dough will be very sticky-wet

    * Shape into two discs on saran wrap -- each disc will be one to two inches thick.  Chilling dough in fridge 3 hours is key to keeping cookies in their shapes.

    * Spread confec sugar/flour on surface--be generous. Roll out dough to 1/4 inch thickness, cut out shapes -- and CAREFULLY lift cookies and place on cookie sheets lined with parchment paper.

    * Bake cookies 15 min. or until just starting to brown on edges.

    * Remove from oven, cool on sheet for 5 min. then CAREFULLY remove from sheet onto cooling rack.  Spread with jam preserves, top each bottom heart with a top.  Before serving, sift confectioners sugar on top.

LINZER TART
(bonus method)

I won't lie, making these cookies is work.  Lazy folks can make this recipe into a tart and it's just as good.  Roll dough into a pie tin, put in a thick layer of preserves (blackberry jam is also good), cut out circles of dough or hearts and scatter across the top. Bake until edges start to brown--about 30 minutes.  Then cover with foil and bake another 5 min.

• • •

Madeline Iva

Madeline Iva writes romances about smart women, men who aren’t intimidated by them, and the hot feisty sex that follows. She loves cray-cray contemporary, paranormal & fantasy romances, and sometimes she likes mixing them all up together.

Book Blurb: THE LADY SMUT BOOK OF DARK DESIRES -- Four paranormal stories of erotic temptation and paranormal thrills!

My novella in this anthology is called SEXSOMNIA. Here's the blurb:

Jenny needs to unravel the mystery of what she does at night and who she does it with in order to subdue the sexual demon inside her.

Grab this book on Amazon in digital and print: