Sand Tarts

This is a cross-reference recipe: it assumes you have already turned to the jumble entry, which is a rolled, rich sugar-cookie dough. Everything here hinges on that dough being cold enough to roll thin.

• You need the jumbles recipe firstTurn to the book's own jumble entry: a stiff, rich rolled sugar-cookie paste of butter, sugar, eggs and flour, with proportions varying from cookbook to cookbook. Sand tarts are simply that dough cut square instead of into rings or rounds.
• Chill before rollingA butter-heavy dough at room temperature will tear and stick. Wrap and refrigerate at least an hour, then roll on a lightly floured board to about 1/8 inch — thin is the point of the cookie.
• Oven temperatureThe original gives none. Bake at 375F for 7 to 9 minutes, until the edges are just brown; these are thin and go from pale to scorched quickly.
• The egg washOne whole egg beaten with a teaspoon of water brushes more evenly than egg alone. Use white only if you want a glassier, less golden finish.
• Granulated versus sanding sugarGranulated sugar of the period was often coarser and less uniform than the modern product. Coarse or sanding sugar gives the crunch the recipe seems to intend; very fine caster sugar tends to melt into the egg wash rather than sit on top.
• The traditional finishMany Pennsylvania German sand tart recipes press a blanched almond half into the centre and dust the top with cinnamon sugar. The book leaves it out, but it is a common finish for the cookie.
• Cutting the squaresA knife or pastry wheel is faster than a cutter and wastes nothing — cut the whole sheet into 2-inch squares and lift them with a thin spatula, since thin dough distorts easily.
• YieldA batch of jumble dough rolled thin will give several dozen 2-inch squares, depending on the size of the batch. Thin, dry cookies of this kind keep well in a tin.