Cubicle kitchen: Potluck Cookie Trio

I didn't set out to bring a smorgasbord of cookies to the potluck we had at work a few weeks ago, it just kind of happened.  You know how that goes?

It started with my wild and crazy desire to try to make an herbed shortbread.  After having experimented with that, I liked the results but didn't have enough faith in them to make them the only cookie I brought, so I went with a pumpkin shortbread that was seasonal and relatively safe.  And then after that I just coated some store-bought pumpkin sandwich cookies in candy melt.  Because I needed to complete the trio.

I didn't adapt either of the recipes sufficiently to reproduce them here, so just a little link love and my notes.

Potluck Cookie Trio
From the top going clockwise:

• Very Best Baking: Autumn-Spiced Pumpkin Shortbread
• No changes, these were delicious!
• Fudge-covered pumpkin sandwich cookies
• Very simple: I took storebought pumpkin sandwich cookies, melted some vanilla candy melt, and dunked the cookies into it, like I would have done with cake balls.  Messy, but effective.
• Food 52: Sweet and Salty Herbed Shortbread
• I used caraway seeds as my herb of choice
• The cookies ended up rather thin in my 7 x 9" pan, I could probably have doubled the recipe for a more average depth.
• Because chocolate makes everything better (especially weird baking ideas), I added a coating of dark chocolate to the squares.
• For those wondering whether caraway cookies 'work', I would say the results were mostly positive.  The seeds have an almost anise/licorice quality to them, so they lend themselves to a more sweet application.  It was most disconcerting to those who had an Eastern European background and associated it with cabbage or baked into bread.