This is another recipe that we always make at Christmas and that I don’t remember having any other time of year. They are a pecan shortbread cookie rolled in powdered sugar (the ones on the left in the picture). I’ve also seen similar cookies by other names, such as Mexican wedding cookies. We make ours in a skinny finger shape though, so we call them nutty fingers or lady fingers.

The recipe makes a bunch, but they are small and tend to go fast. They are slightly more labor intensive than some cookies, but they are absolutely delicious. The recipe comes from my grandmother, who always made them when my mom was growing up.

You might also like:

• Pecan Toffee
• Date Rock Cookies
• Mocha Peppermint Bark Cookies
• Peppermint Bark
• Christmas Cookies

Nutty Fingers

Ingredients:

9 T powdered sugar
2 c cake flour
Pinch of salt
1 1/2 sticks butter
1 t vanilla
1 T ice water
1 c chopped pecans
More powdered sugar for rolling

Preheat oven to 350 F. Sift together flour, sugar, and salt. Cut butter into flour mixture. Add vanilla, ice water, and pecans. Mix well, kind of squishing dough together with hands until just mixed. It makes a pretty crumbly dough, but it sticks together enough to mold into finger shapes.

Roll cookies into skinny logs maybe an inch and a half long (we think they are better pretty small like that). Place on a greased cookie sheet. They can be pretty close together as they don’t expand much when they bake. Try to make them as even in size as possible or some will be burned and some underdone. Bake at 350 F high up in the oven for about 15 minutes. You want them to get done, but not brown.

Let cool just slightly and remove to wire racks. When they are mostly cool (so the sugar doesn’t melt but will still stick) roll in powdered sugar.

Tags: Christmas, Cookies, finger food, Holiday, nuts

This entry was posted on Friday, January 4th, 2008 at 6:43 pm and is filed under Cookies, Dessert, Family Recipe, Holiday, Recipes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.