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My keto shortbread cookie recipe yields rich, buttery, perfectly crisp cookies. Made in one bowl, I love how they taste just like classic shortbread cookies! 2 grams net carbs per cookie.
Craving more keto cookie recipes? Try my keto chocolate chip cookies, keto lemon cookies, and keto sugar cookies next.
Come the holiday season, I’m making keto shortbread cookies by the dozens. This may surprise you, but my almond flour shortbread cookies are even more highly requested than any of my other holiday treats.
Table of Contents
Why I love this recipe
- 5 ingredients. And no niche or fussy substitutions required!
- Perfect texture and flavor. Crisp on the edges, soft in the center, and loaded with buttery flavor, these cookies tick all the boxes.
- Easy to customize. I’m boring and like my shortbread cookies plain, but I tested a few creative flavors so you can switch things up.
- Diet-friendly. Without even trying, these cookies are gluten-free and dairy-free.
★★★★★ REVIEW
“Amazing recipe! Easy to make, great tasting low carb cookie” – KO
Ingredients needed
- Butter. I always suggest using unsalted butter since there’s no telling how much salt gets added to salted butter. A pinch of salt can be quite overpowering, especially in this recipe.
- Sweetener. I prefer allulose since it has the most sugary flavor, but use whatever sugar-free sweetener you prefer.
- Large egg. I tried this recipe without the eggs to make them vegan, and it made for a very burnt flavor and dark color, so don’t skip these.
- Vanilla extract. A must for any good cookie recipe!
- Almond flour. Use blanched almond flour over almond meal and make sure it’s fine in texture, akin to powdered sugar. I tried this recipe with coconut flour, and the cookies were too dry and crumbly.
How to make keto shortbread cookies
I’ve included step-by-step photos below to make this recipe easy to follow at home. For the full printable recipe instructions and ingredient quantities, scroll to the recipe card at the bottom of this post.
Step 1- Prep. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Step 2- Combine ingredients. In a large bowl, add the softened butter and sweetener. Using a hand mixer, beat until creamy. Add the vanilla and eggs, one at a time, until combined. Fold in the almond flour until combined.
Step 3- Shape. Using a cookie scoop, form 12-15 dough balls and place on the lined pan. Press each ball into a cookie shape, then make crisscross patterns with a fork.
Step 4- Bake. Bake the cookies for 17-20 minutes or until they turn golden on the edges. Remove from the oven and let cool completely.
Arman’s recipe tips
- Don’t overbake the cookies. They’ll continue cooking as they cool (AKA “carryover cooking”), so pull them from the oven as soon as they turn golden, and the edges pull away from the baking sheet.
- Make the dough ahead of time. If you’d like to bake the cookies later, you can refrigerate the dough for up to 3 days. Just remember to let the dough sit at room temperature for 30 minutes before rolling it out.
- Add a final touch. For added decoration, I like to brush the tops of the cookies with melted butter and a sprinkle of keto brown sugar.
- Transfer them to a wire rack. So they cool more quickly.
Flavor variations
While this keto shortbread recipe works wonders on its own, you can change up the flavor for some fun variety!
- Cinnamon shortbread. Add 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon and sprinkle the baked cookies with cinnamon and sweetener.
- Cranberry shortbread. Fold 1/4 cup dried cranberries into the dough.
- Lavender shortbread. Add 2 teaspoons of dried lavender to the dough.
- Lemon shortbread. Fold through some lemon zest and add several drops of lemon extract.
- Chocolate chip shortbread. Add 1/4 cup sugar-free chocolate chips.
Storage instructions
To store: Leftover keto shortbread cookies can be kept in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 1 week or in the refrigerator for up to 1 month.
To freeze: Wrap the leftover cookies in plastic wrap and freeze them in a freezer-safe container for up to 6 months.
Frequently asked questions
Shortbread cookies have a higher butter-to-flour ratio and are baked at a lower temperature than butter cookies, making them softer and crumblier.
More low-carb holiday treats to try
Keto Shortbread Cookies
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup allulose
- 1/4 cup butter softened and salted
- 2 large eggs room temperarure
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 cups almond flour blanched almond flour
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180C/350F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
- In a large mixing bowl, add your softened butter and allulose. Using a hand mixer, beat together until creamy. Add the vanilla extract and eggs, one at a time, until combined and smooth. Gently fold in the almond flour, until combined.
- Using a large spoon or cookie scoop, form 12-15 balls of dough and place on the lined pan. Press down on each ball into a cookie shape, followed by crossing on either side with a fork.
- Bake the cookies for 17-20 minutes, or until beginning to go golden around the edges. Remove from the oven and allow cookies to cool completely.
Someone may have asked this already. The recipe says to use unsalted butter but the ingredients say to use “softened and salted”. I am thinking the word salted is just missing the “un” but wanted to make sure first.
Nevermind I found where you answered this already and it’s unsalted. Thank you!
Amazing recipe! Easy to make, great tasting low carb cookie
Very nice. Thank you! I’ve yet to find a bad recipe here. You’re great!
The best keto shortbread cookies ever. SO GOOD.
Hands down, the BEST keto shortbread cookies recipe I’ve ever made- crisp and crumbly and just the texture you’d expect.
Love!!!! this recipe! I used the cookie crumbs for the crust on my cheesecake. Let them cool completely, very crunchy, perfect! Basically made it just like a graham crust, perfect keto crust,Thanks Arman 🙂
I added the cinnamon and Lilly’s white chocolate chips. 18 minutes baking time for mr. Very good!
This recipe is amazing! I have used it to create a crust for a cheesecake bars and a key lime pie bars. I just double the butter, add 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon and press it into the bottom of a 9×13 pan. I have to cook it appropriately 30 minutes since it’s literally 1 large cookie, but it makes the perfect keto friendly graham cracker crust! Thank you so much for sharing this recipe! I’ve been bookmarking other recipes as well. 🙂
I have a question about the Almond flour. I’m new to cooking for Keto this year, so I’m not sure what I did wrong. I doubled your recipe because I needed to split these between my two adult boys. I had a problem with the texture of the dough. After adding the 4 Cups of almond flour (doubled recipe) the dough was the consistency of wet mashed potatoes. There could be no forming any balls with it, certainly not to “press down”. Imagine having instructions to form balls and press down with overly wet mashed potatoes. So I ended up having to add a LOT more almond flour to get typical cookie dough batter texture. Was I supposed to be using the wet, loose dough? If so, how? The finest super fine Almond flour I could find anywhere was from King Arthur. They have a super fine blanched kind. I measured the first cup, and there were big clumps creating air pockets in the measuring cup. So I stopped and sifted the entire bag first. Does sifting fluff it up and make it appear double the actual measure? Did I initially really only add 2C thinking I added 4C because of what sifting did? Is that what went wrong? According to the label there should be 3-1/2 C total in the bag. After sifting I had almost 6 C. Manufacturers may be imprecise sometimes with their weight and volume, but that’s practically double. Can you help me figure out if I did the right thing, if there is a difference in measuring sifted almond flour vs measuring right out of the bag? And would they have had a better shortbread texture and buttery taste with less almond flour if I had worked with the wet loose dough instead? Thank you! Love your work.
Quick question about the sweetener. For the monkfruit sweetener, are you using pure monk fruit sweetener or one that is cut with something else?
I used the baking variety
What an awesome recipe. The cookie texture is absolutely amazing! I have made them in Chocolate, orange (added orange extract & little peel), lemon (lemon extract & peel) (using your lemon curd recipe (too die for) and putting a thumb imprint before baking the cookies, then adding a little bit of your curd to the top. Huge hit!; dehydrated some cherries and strawberries and again, a little bit of extracts to accompany. The other day I used them as a base instead of graham cracker crumbs. Thank you so much for sharing.
Nice general cookie texture but unlike shortbread. It did work very well with shortbread molds. For a second batch, we added lemon zest and cinnamon for flavor.
Hi Arman! I can’t wait to make these as gifts! Do I use salted or unsalted butter?
Hi! Unsalted is best 🙂
I absolutely love this recipe. They are so yummy. I eat mine straight from the freezer.
Your pancake recipe is amazing too. Thank you for sharing Arman.
You are so welcome!
Hi! Do you have a good almond flour substitute in this recipe for nut allergies?
Thank you!
You can try wholwheat flour or all purpose flour and see!
Can the almond flour be replaced with coconut flour?
Thanks!
Not for this recipe!
In your ingredients part of the recipe it says the butter needs to be unsalted but then when you get to the actual recipe part it says the butter is salted.
Arman, could you please clarify which type of butter to use? Salted or unsalted.
Unsalted butter 🙂