These showy cookies with a delicate orange flavor are best made into small rounds. They are adapted from a Willliams Sonoma recipe and work well in the winter when oranges are plentiful and chocolate won’t melt! 

Ingredients:  

1. 4 teaspoons grated orange zest
2. 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
3. ½ cup sugar
4. ¼ cup cornstarch
5. ¼ teaspoon salt
6. ¾ cup chilled unsalted butter
7. ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
8. 4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees and prepare 2 baking sheets with parchment paper 

1. Grate the skin of a large orange being careful not to include the white pulp.  You need 4 teaspoons.  Set aside.
2. In a food processor, combine the flour, sugar, cornstarch, orange zest and salt.
3. Process briefly until well mixed.
4. Cut the butter into ½” slices and add along with the vanilla and pulse until the mixture resembles fine meal.  Then process continuously until moist clumps form.
5. Transfer the mixture to a large sheet of lightly floured waxed paper and gather the mixture into a clump.  Top with a second sheet of waxed paper.
6. Roll out the dough to a 1/8”thickness using a round 2 ½”cutter, cut out cookies.  Save scraps and re-roll them but don’t include them in the same batch as the freshly rolled out cookies as worked over dough tends to shrink.  You may need to refrigerate the dough after rolling it but before cutting it out.
7. Bake cookies until they begin to brown at the edges, about 12 minutes.
8. Remove to a cooling rack.  Meanwhile, place the chocolate in the top of a double boiler or place the pan with the chocolate in another pan of water.  Simmer the water stirring the chocolate frequently until smooth & melted.
9. Place the melted chocolate in a small bowl and dip the cookies into them covering them halfway.  Tilt the cookies back and forth otherwise only one side tends to get covered otherwise.
10. Lay on an aluminum foil or waxed paper covered baking sheet to cool.  Once chocolate is cooled, transfer to an airtight container.