Scrumptious Cookies

My Mom makes these cookies.  Me too.  The recipe is from the New York Times Cookbook.  This great cookbook was probably the first one I ever received, and it was an earlier edition.  This recipe for Viennese Crescents was from that cookbook.

These and sugar cookies are my favorite Christmas cookies.  These are easier to make. 

Viennese Crescents:

1/4 vanilla bean
1 cup sifted confectioner's sugar
1 cup English walnut meats
1 cup butter at room temperature (2 sticks)
3/4 cup sugar
2 1/2 cups sifted all-purpose flour

*     *     *     *     *

Chop and pulverize the vanilla bean.  Mix with the confectioner's sugar.  Let stand.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cut up walnuts.  Process to paste.

Mix walnuts, butter, granulated sugar and flour to form a smooth dough.  Shape into crescents.

Bake on an ungreased cookie sheet 15 to 18 minutes.  Cool one minute.  Roll in the vanilla sugar while still warm.  Allow to cool on a rack.

Comments

[Shawn Lea]

Do they taste like Mexican wedding cookies? I love those!

[trouble]

The Carnival of the Recipes is up at:

http://dubiouswonder.blogspot.com/2005/12/carnival-of-recipes_10.html

And your recipe has been posted. Can you please include a link to the Carnival on your blog? Thanks!

[alana sullivan]

Essentially the same recepie for Mexican Wedding Cakes and Almond Cressants from the first edition of Joy of Cooking. The biggest difference is in the shaping of the cookies. Round in is much less time consuming than nice cressants.

If you can buy ground walnuts or pecans, you'll save a lot of effort. Any nut flour would probably work.

[Jami Leigh]

These are beautiful, I can't wait to try them.

[Robert Thornton]

They are without a doubt the finest cookies in the world.