Almond Spritz Cookies

Almond Cookies.

Although winter has come to some parts of the world it is still away from where I live right now. I don’t know for how long though, since it is very cold outside. Regardless, I thought I will bring some sugar powder snow to my kitchen and freshly baked cookies. Almond Spritz Cookies are great to form with pastry bag, which allows being creative, or cookie press, which gives you perfectly shaped cookies. Regardless of what you use, they are always delicious and very almondy 🙂

This recipe was adapted from Cook’s Illustrated.

Ingredients:

• 1 large egg yolk
• 1 tbs heavy cream
• 3/4tsp almond extrtact
• 1/2cup scliced almonds
• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 cup unsalted butter (2 sticks) – softened
•  2/3 cup sugar
• 1/4tsp salt

Intructions:

1. Preheat oven to 375°F. Prepare two baking sheets.
2. In a small bowl whisk together yolk, cream and almond extract. Set aside.
3. Using a food processor grind almond with 2tbsp of flour until they are “flour like”. To get this result grind them for about 60s.
4. Mix almond mixture with remaining flour. Set aside.
5. In a mixer bowl cream butter, sugar and salt until light and fluffy (about 3 minutes).
6. Scrape down bowl, add the yolk mixture and beat until incorporated.
7. Scrape down bowl again and add gradually flour, while mixer is running at a low speed.
8. Scrape down bowl again and stir with a spatula to make sure no flour pockets remain.
9. Use pastry bag or cookie press to form cookies.
10. Bake them for 10 to 12 minutes, until they are golden brown. Let cool on the cookie sheet.
11. Sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Yield: ~89 cookies (using pastry bag)

Nutritional Info (3 cookies): Cal 116, Prot 1g, Carb 11g, Fat 7g, Fiber 0.4g

Almond Cookies.