Russian Tea Cakes

Russian tea cake, Mexican wedding cookie or snowball. Whatever you call them they’re a very traditional Christmas cookie and always a favorite.

Toasting your almonds will give your cookies a deeper and more robust flavor.

It’s always important to slowly cream your butter with sugar to prevent the sugar from “burning ” the yolk. This happens when the yolk absorbs too much sugar and makes yolky lumps in the batter. A well creamed butter and sugar mixture with provide structure to your dessert.

Mix in your roughly chopped almonds until just combined with the batter.

Form the dough into a ball, wrap in plastic wrap and chill. Chilling the dough with prevent the cookies from crumbling drastically when forming the cookie balls.

I like to roll the cookies in confectioners’ sugar after they are cool enough to touch and then again after they have cooled completely.

Ingredients

Makes 4 dozen cookies

• 1 1/2 cups butter, at room temperature
• 1 cup granulated sugar, or as per desire.
• 2 eggs
• 3 tsp vanilla extract
• 4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 3 cups roughly chopped toasted almonds

Directions

1. Slowly cream the butter and the sugar together. Once the mixture is creamy, add the eggs, one at a time, and mix until incorporated. Add the vanilla with the last egg.
2. Whisk together the flour and salt, and add to the creamed mixture. Mix together until the flour is combined. Add the chopped almonds and mix just until incorporated. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for one hour.
3. Preheat the oven to 350ºF.
4. Remove the dough from the refrigerator, and roll about a tablespoon of dough into a ball (Each ball should be about one inch in diameter.) Bake for 20-22 minutes, until lightly golden on the bottom. After you remove them from the oven, let them cool slightly for about 5 minutes, then roll in powdered sugar or coconut crumbs. After they cool completely, roll again in the sugar or coconut.