Combine the butter, sugar and salt. Cream the mixture on medium speed until blended, about 2 minutes.
1 ¾ cups unsalted butter, 1 ½ cups granulated sugar, 2 teaspoons kosher salt
Add the egg yolks one at a time, mixing after each addition until incorporated.
3 egg yolks
Add the vanilla extract and the scrapings of the vanilla bean. Scrape down the bowl.
2 tablespoons vanilla extract, 1 vanilla bean
Turn the mixer off and add the flour. Turn the machine to low and mix until the flour is incorporated. Do not overmix
3 ¾ cups all-purpose flour
Remove the dough from the bowl. Working on parchment or wax paper, shape dough into 4 logs, each 10 inches long and 1 ¼ inch in diameter. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill overnight (or at least 4 hours).
Slice the logs into ¼ inch slices. Place the slices on a baking sheets lined with parchment paper.
Bake at 325℉, 15-20 minutes until golden brown.
Chocolate for Dipping
Melt the chocolate in a double boiler. Alternatively you can melt chips in the microwave: Microwave on high for 2 min, stir, then microwave 1 min at a time until thoroughly melted.
Dip one end of the cooled cookies in chocolate. Set on wax or parchment paper and let chocolate harden.
RECIPE TIPS
Recipe VariationsShortbread Rolled In SugarYou can add a fancy edge of sugar to your cookies by rolling the logs in coarse sugar, like turbinado, or colored sanding sugar before you refrigerate the dough.Chocolate Chip ShortbreadAdd 12 to 24 ounces of chocolate chips or chopped semi-sweet baking chocolate to the shortbread dough. I like to err on the side of too much chocolate. 😃Chocolate ShortbreadReplace a ½ cup of flour with cocoa powder to make a chocolate shortbread dough. You can use dutch process cocoa powder or black cocoa powder which will give you a rich extra dark cookie.