Wedding Cookies and A Christmas Recap

Ok, I promised a Christmas recap.  As a blogger, what you blog about for any given holiday is not necessarily what you make for your family for that day.  I mean, if you are going to have a chance to look at my recipe and decide to make it, it is going to have to be published before I would actually make it for the big day.  And, I don’t actually make a lot of Christmas food that isn’t sweet because my parents have Christmas at there house and do almost all of the cooking – and they have it down to quite an art.  So, while we did eat the fudge, chocolate chip cookies, and lebkuchen I made earlier and the icebox fruit cake I posted yesterday, we had these other cookies and candies too – all made too late to blog about before Christmas.  Everyone picked one cookie or candy and we made them all on the 23rd and 24th.

The  cut out cookies pictured below were a slight adaption of this recipe from The Kitchn.  Eventually, I may post my adaption to this recipe, but it was slight, and they were perfect, so I can’t recommend this recipe enough.  We decorated them with American buttercream and sprinkles.  Yes, I know royal icing makes prettier cookies, but this was my daughter’s cookie pick, and she really doesn’t like royal icing.  I have to say, the buttercream was the perfect compliment to the cookies.

My son’s picked these peanut butter balls, which almost everyone adores.  I must admit that they are a bit sweet for me, but I think I’m the only one.  My husband picked the jam thumbprints also pictured below.  I have shared both of these recipes with you before, so follow the links to see them again.

The cookies we made for me this year were what most people know as wedding cookies or tea cakes.  I have heard them described as both Mexican and Russian, and I have seen them with almost every nut.  Growing up, we just called them the white cookies.  They have always been one of my favorites, and I have made them with many different add-ins instead of the nuts because my daughter is nut allergic, but my favorite flavor is pecan, which is what is pictured here.  I know there are about a million recipes out there for these cookies – all similar, but this is the way my mother made them.

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Wedding Cookies and A Christmas Recap

Prep 1 hour, 20 mins

Cook 12 mins

Total 1 hour, 32 mins

Author Michelle

Yield 30

Ingredients

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter at room temperature (I use salted because we did when I was growing up, but you could use unsalted and add an additional 1/2 tsp. salt.)
• 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar, plus a lot more for rolling
• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 3/4 cup pecans, finely chopped

Instructions

1. Cream together butter and 1/2 cup confectionser’s sugar with an electric mixer.
2. Mix in remaining ingredients until well combined.
3. Refrigerate at least one hour.
4. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
5. Roll dough into 1 inch balls.
6. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden being careful not to burn the bottoms.
7. Roll immediately in confectioners’ sugar.
8. Allow to cool completely and then roll again in confectioners’ sugar.

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