Description
Polvorones de Navidad bring delightful Mexican holiday cheer to cookie lovers everywhere. Delicate almond-dusted shortbread melts in your mouth, offering a sweet connection to traditional Christmas celebrations.
Ingredients
Scale
- 2 cups (250 g / 8.8 oz) all-purpose flour
- 1 cup (225 g / 8 oz) unsalted butter, softened
- 1 cup (120 g / 4.2 oz) finely chopped pecans or walnuts
- ½ cup (60 g / 2.1 oz) powdered sugar, plus extra for dusting
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- ¼ tsp salt
Instructions
- Thermal Preparation: Activate oven to 350F (175C) and strategically line baking sheets with parchment paper to optimize cookie development.
- Dough Foundation: Whip softened butter and powdered sugar into a silky, ethereal mixture, blending until achieving a luxurious, airy consistency.
- Flavor Infusion: Integrate vanilla extract thoroughly into the butter mixture, ensuring comprehensive aromatic enhancement and seamless incorporation.
- Structural Integration: Merge flour and salt into the creamy base, gently combining until a tender, cohesive dough materializes with smooth precision.
- Textural Enrichment: Disperse finely chopped nuts throughout the dough, guaranteeing uniform distribution for consistent flavor and delightful crunch.
- Shaping Protocol: Mold dough into uniform tablespoon-sized spheres, arranging them methodically on prepared baking surfaces with strategic spacing to facilitate even baking.
- Surface Refinement: Gently compress cookie tops using fingertips, creating an elegant, sophisticated profile that promises delicate texture.
- Thermal Transformation: Bake in preheated oven for 12-15 minutes, watching for subtle golden edges that signal perfect doneness and culinary success.
- Cooling Sequence: Rest cookies momentarily on baking sheets, allowing structural stabilization before initiating the powdered sugar coating ritual.
- Final Embellishment: While cookies retain residual warmth, completely enrobe them in a pristine powdered sugar layer, ensuring comprehensive, elegant coverage that celebrates traditional Mexican Christmas cookie artistry.
Notes
- Butter Temperature Control: Ensure butter is genuinely softened, not melted, to achieve the perfect cloud-like texture essential for authentic Mexican Christmas cookies.
- Nut Distribution Technique: Chop nuts finely and fold gently to prevent overwhelming the delicate cookie structure, creating balanced flavor in every bite.
- Sugar Coating Strategy: Apply first powdered sugar layer while cookies are still warm for maximum sugar absorption, then add second layer after complete cooling for a pristine, festive appearance.
- Precise Baking Watch: Monitor oven closely during 12-15 minute baking window, as golden edges indicate optimal doneness without risking over-browning or dryness.
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Category: Desserts, Snacks
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: Mexican
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 25
- Calories: 143
- Sugar: 2 g
- Sodium: 10 mg
- Fat: 13 g
- Saturated Fat: 8 g
- Unsaturated Fat: 5 g
- Trans Fat: 0 g
- Carbohydrates: 9 g
- Fiber: 1 g
- Protein: 2 g
- Cholesterol: 30 mg