Just wanted to say that I also received my pure ground vanilla beans and used that in place of the liquid vanilla.

bakingfool

I made this recipe and substituted toasted chopped almonds for the pecans and the coconut sugar for the agave nectar. I wasn’t sure they would turn out because of using a dry sweetener in place of the liquid but they came out GREAT!

I don’t follow Elana’s directions, just the ingredients list. This time I rolled the batter into 24 balls and flattened them on my parchment paper to about 1/4 inch thickness, baked for 12 minutes. The batter held together well and was just the right texture to roll. They came out dry and crispy just like shortbread but the cookies are not crumbly and I didn’t have to let them cool on the sheets before removing to the racks. They worked just like a “regular flour” cookie.

Best of all is, even 2 hours after eating some, I still don’t have heart palpitations or racing heart! No negative effects like with real sugar, honey, and other stuff for me. I hope this continues and in a few days I can say I have finally found a sugar substitute I can use!

I post as "bakingfool" in the forums as my name was already taken.

Creamed my room temp. butter with 1 1/2 c. almond flour. Stirred the rest of the dry ingredients into another bowl. Added the agave to the creamed mixture and blended well. Then added in the dry mixture. Scooped onto parchment lined sheet. 10 minutes at 350 degrees was perfect. 24 cookies exactly.

Getting them off the sheet without crumbling was a bit of trouble. They wanted to fall apart. So..I let them cool on the parchment and the pan for 2 minutes, then carefully slid the parchment onto a rack for 2 minutes, before removing from the parchment. Saved them from any more crumbles. They can now be picked up whole.

Will try these the proper way some time because I love shortbread too!