These Lemon Verbena Shortbread Sandwich Cookies with Vegan Lemon Curd Filling were quite a hit, with men and women alike, at a recent potluck garden party.  A buzz spread through the party as one guest tried them and passed the word.  I happily took home an empty platter!

The cookies are simple, but very special in appearance and flavor.  The shortbread recipe is from my Blooming Platter Cookbook (copyright© 2011, Vegan Heritage Press; used by permission).  And the ingenious Vegan Lemon Curd is from my friend and fellow vegan cookbook author/blogger, Bryanna Clark Grogan.  The secret ingredient that replaces the eggs in the curd is, believe it or not, the lowly parsnip!  You won’t believe how perfectly parsnips make this curd mimic its dairy cousin.  (The lemon verbena leaves fleck the cookies with green, so if you prefer a matching green filling, Bryanna’s recipe easily adapts to lime curd for a lemon-lime version of this sandwich cookie.)

If you don’t have lemon verbena growing in our garden, you should!  But if it isn’t available, you can substitute lemon zest, I’m just not sure how much, but I would start with the zest of one large lemon and taste.  Remember, vegan cookies contain no eggs, so taste away.  You can also substitute fresh lemon juice for the water for a zippier cookie.  However, nothing quite duplicates the earthy, herby, citrusy goodness of lemon verbena.

Thanks to One Green Planet for publishing my Lemon Verbena Shortbread Sandwich Cookies with Vegan Lemon Curd Filling!