This is an old-fashioned cookie; my version is from my grandmother’s recipe box, but it is available with little variation on many food websites.
Cream 1 cup of butter with 1/2 cup of confectioners’ sugar (yup, the powdered stuff); you want it to be fluffy. Mix in 1 teaspoon of vanilla. Blend in 2 and 1/4 cups flour and 1/4 teaspoon salt. When combined, mix in 3/4 cup of pulverized pecans. I put the chopped pecans in a zip lock baggy and crush them with a rolling pin.
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and refrigerate the dough until it is chilled, maybe 20 or 30 minutes?
Take your chilled dough and roll it into 1-inch balls, dunking each cookie ball in a bowl of confectioners’ sugar – you want them to be covered in white. Bake on an ungreased cookie sheet for 10-12 minutes. Remove from the sheet and allow to cool.
Some recipes call for rolling the still-warm cookies in another sugar bath, but I don’t think it is necessary, plus it gets messy.
Should you make these? Yes! They almost melt in your mouth and taste like nostalgia, but in a good way.
Yum. I haven’t had cookies like that in a long time. If my husband wasn’t allergic to nuts I’d be all over this.
They really do melt in your mouth…
I’m also allergic to nuts. When I want that nutty crunch in baked goods, a handful of pepitas (pumpkin seeds) are often a good substitute. The challenge is finding a brand that isn’t made in a nut factory. Go Raw is my current go to brand, I just toast them myself
I wonder if they could be used instead of pecans?
Pepitas and sunflower seeds work for a lot of things. Luckily my husband is only allergic to tree nuts, not peanuts, and peanuts also work in a lot of applications.
Lucky him. I’m allergic to both 😑
So simple and perfect! I bet this would be a fun thing to make with kids, assuming they didn’t get the confectioner’s sugar all over themselves or throw it at each other.
That may be part of the fun – I can’t see kids doing this without making a mess!
They are messy. Ellie said to me “Did you eat a cookie?”. I replied ” How did you know?”. She said ” I can see the white powder marks on you”. BUSTED.
Two-a-day limit…
I recently saw a recipe for a chocolate version of this. My reaction – if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. These are perfect little cookies.
Thanks Hannibal, even I, a confessed chocoholic like them as is.
Always love these! I feel like I’ve made them with walnuts as well.