SnowballCookies

A ridiculously simple recipe for making delicious buttery cookies. Traditionally made at my house for Christmas (by me, in recent years), but also when I have a craving for baking tasty things.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup butter
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 2 cups flour
• 3/2 - 2 cups chopped nuts (pecans or walnuts, usually; to taste)
  • Chopped butterscotch baking bits may be substituted and are also delicious. --FrancesHocutt

• lots more powdered sugar for rolling cookies in

Preheat oven to 325.

Soften butter in microwave--do not melt! Melting probably doesn't matter, but it's not as fun because you can't squish the butter lumps. Cream the softened butter, salt, vanilla, and powdered sugar in a mixing bowl with a spatula or spoon. It doesn't look terribly appetizing, but smells nice and vanilla-y. Add 2 cups flour gradually while mixing. After this, the dough should be of a consistency that sticks together well when rolled into balls. It's difficult to go completely wrong with this unless you really screw up the proportions of stuff in the recipe. Add nuts gradually while mixing. Taste dough; it should be sweet, not floury. If it tastes floury, try adding a little more sugar.

Find a cookie sheet. If you're not confident about its non-stick abilities, grease it. Otherwise, don't bother--they're not very sticky cookies. Shape dough into balls approximately 1 1/4 inches in diameter, give or take. Size is somewhat unimportant; they grow a little during baking, but not much, and you should be able to tell after the first batch how big the rest of them should be. Bake for 12 minutes. While they're baking, get a bowl (for preference; plates probably work too) and fill it with powdered sugar. When it's been 12 minutes, check cookie bottoms. They should be a tannish-light brown sort of color. The top of the cookie won't necessarily look done, but don't worry too much--if the bottoms are brown, the cookies are done. Remove from cookie sheet, roll them in powdered sugar, and place on cooling rack/paper towels to cool. If paper towels, make sure that counter is completely dry. My preferred method for doing this is to plunk one or two cookies at a time directly into the powered sugar with the spatula, roll them around gingerly until they're completely covered, and try not to burn my fingers too much as I transfer them to the cooling rack. Beware, for they may be somewhat crumbly if poked too hard or dropped on floor. It's tragic, but the cookie remains must be disposed of somehow. I recommend eating. Try not to poke too many cookies, because then you don't get any whole ones.

Optional: When cookies are completely cool, roll them in powdered sugar again for extra tastiness and that added snowball-white look.

Single recipe makes around 30. Double recipe makes around 70. Yeah, I dunno.