Mexican Wedding Cookies

Or...butter + powdered sugar = delicious.

So, Matt's been bugging me to make these for awhile. It's a simple recipe with few ingredients...these tend to be my favorites in terms of recipes. Too many ingredients sometimes muddle the taste. If you have good ingredients, why not showcase them?

It's been probably a good two years since I've made these cookies. I couldn't remember why, I assumed it was just because these cookies are delicate and don't travel well. Much of my baking has to stand-up to the subway test (can I take them into work? Yes = good recipe, No = seldom made recipe). Our apartment isn't fantastic for entertaining, so delicate recipes tend not to be made often. What I realized when making them is I hadn't made them because they require hand shaping. I'm a lazy baker and prefer drop cookies, or cookie cutter cookies. I'm not gonna lie. But...Matt wanted them, so I made them.

Of course...for Matt's sake I was incredibly messy in my baking since he was home. No one has ever (or will ever) accuse me of keeping my workspace clean. However, I managed to drop my container of flour (ie...the top came off when I was taking it from the shelf) and got flour all over the kitchen. Always an adventure...

Anyway, without further ado:

Mexican Wedding Cookies
adapted from Paul Deen
Paula Deen & Friends Cookbook

Prep time: approx 15 mins
Baking time: 45 mins
Total time: about 1 hour + cooling
Makes about 2 1/2 dzn cookies

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar, plus more for coating baked cookies
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting hands
1 cup pecans, chopped into ver small pieces

1. Preheat oven to 275 degrees F. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.

2. Using an electric mixer at low speed, cream the butter and confectioners' sugar until smooth. Beat in the vanilla. At low speed, gradually add the flour. Mix in the pecans with a spatual.

3. With floured hands, take out about 1 TBS of dough and shape it into a crescent. Continue to dust hands with flour as you make more cookies. Place them 1 inch apart from one another on prepared cookie sheets. Bake for 45 minutes.

4. Roll in additional confectioners' sugar while still warm. Cook completely on wire racks and store in airtight tins. So...a few adjustments this time around, and we will see how they go.

• I was running low on pecans (a travesty, I know) so I used about 1/2 pecans & 1/2 walnuts. I use these nuts interchangeably a lot anyway. I tend to like pecans more then walnuts and use them to punch up recipes that call for walnuts. The walnuts don't show in the taste, but there is a bit of a walnut-ty after taste. I do prefer the pecans, but think the walnuts aren't a bad way to go.
• I'm generous with my vanilla use.

Enjoy!