Cooking with the Seasons - Fall

Hi everyone --

I just wanted to share two quick cookie recipes to go along with my photo on the newly launched Holiday Recipes Photo Gallery.  These are two of my favorite cookies.

Russian Tea Cakes (aka Mexican Wedding Cakes)

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, room temperature
1/2 cups powdered sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup pecans, finely chopped

1 cup powdered sugar for coating

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Beat butter in bowl until light and fluffy. Mix in 1/2 cup powdered sugar and vanilla; blend well. Stir in flour, then pecans. Wrap dough in plastic and chill approx. 30 minutes.

Roll dough into 1 inch balls. Place on baking sheet, 1/2 inch apart. Bake cookies just until set or only slightly golden. Allow cookies to cool slightly; gently toss warm cookies in powdered sugar.

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Lemon Crinkles

(This is a recipe from my grandma, who makes these in advance and stores bagfuls in the freezer. She makes hers an almost glowing yellow, but you can adjust the flavoring/coloring to your taste.)

3/4 cup shortening

1 1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
2 tsp. lemon extract
1/4 teaspoon yellow food coloring
1/4 cup evaporated milk
2 cups sifted flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt

Preheat oven to 350°F. Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt; set aside. Cream together shortening and sugar; mix in egg along with lemon extract and food coloring.  Chill dough for 30-60 minutes. Roll chilled dough into 1 inch balls with wet hands. Roll in granulated sugar and place on ungreased cookie sheet. Press with bottom of a glass to flatten slightly. Bake at 350°F for 12-13 minutes.

Enjoy!

Hey there Caryn, and thank you, the Russian tea cakes I have seen (but we don't have them here) BUT.....drum roll....

Love the sound of those Lemon crinkles. DS is not happy with me since last night I baked his batch of cookies with refrigerator dough AFTER thawing it and ended up with doorstops (mind you his GF was standing there and could have said something since I was trying out my new kitchen and first lot of cookies). LOVE lemon and these sound so simple so I am using 'send to a friend' to send to DD. She might make me some for Christmas. (Wink wink)

Thanks so much for stopping by and I will be sure to stop by that photo gallery tomorrow...dropping asleep right now, and still have presents to wrap! Are you all done???? I bet you are. A watch I ordered for DS as his major present won't be here till mid January, so tomorrow I am on the hunt again.

Please come back and see us again soon.

COOKING WITH THE SEASONS...WINTER!

I wrote down the recipe. I started to make it. When it came to creaming the shortening and sugar.... you never gave an amount for sugar.  What type of sugar and how much?

Lemon Crinkles

Thank You