It almost couldn’t be a kitchen frolic Cookie Recipe Advent Calendar without a recipe from Cakeyboi!
Cakeyboi, also known as Stuart, he’s a baker / food blogger based in Scotland that I have yet to meet in real life, but that hasn’t stopped us from becoming good friends online. We even make a point of taking certain vacation photos showcasing new McFlurry flavours just to show off to each other!
I’m waiting for the day he manages to bake a McFlurry Cookie just for me… but in the meantime, I’ll have to settle for these lovely Christmassy cookies instead.
guest post by Stuart from Cakeyboi
Stuart’s previous kitchen frolic cookie recipe advent calendar posts:
– 2012: gingerbread bois
– 2013: rhubarb and ginger linzer cookies
Nutty and Nice
Anyone who knows me, knows that I love Christmas. It really is my favourite time of the year and when Stephanie asks me to enter a cookie into the Advent Cooke Recipe Calendar, she knows that I would never say no to her!
This is my third year of taking part. THREE years?! Where has time gone? It seems like just yesterday I was feeling my way around the blogging community, not really sure of what I was doing. And it still feels like that sometimes truth be told!
In the past I have entered linzer cookies and gingerbread into the calendar, so this year I decided to go with a particular flavour combination I love. Chocolate and Hazelnut in a snowball cookie. It must be my Italian roots.
These cute cookies are round like a snowball and dunked into icing sugar, just like snow. But the inside is a mix of ground up hazelnuts and cacao powder to give that unmistakable flavour, just like a certain spread that begins with ‘N’ and ends with ‘ella’.
I worried they might collapse in the oven and not keep their ball shape, but I chilled them in the fridge before I popped them in the oven and that seemed to help them keep their shape. Fear not! When baked you give them two coatings of the icing sugar, once when slightly warm and again when they are cool. Lastly, I sprinkled on some edible glitter to give that frozen look, which is, of course, entirely optional (but fun!).
Thanks again to Stephanie for asking me to be a part of the calendar. It’s great fun to see the variety of cookies out there. Happy Holiday’s everyone!
- 170 grams unsalted butter, very soft
- 150 grams plain flour, less two tablespoons
- 150 grams ground hazelnuts
- 2 tablespoons raw cacao powder (or unsweetened cocoa)
- 50 grams granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
- Icing sugar for dusting
- Edible glitter for garnish (optional)
- Preheat the oven to 160C and line a cookie sheet with greaseproof paper.
- In a bowl of a mixer, place the butter, flour, hazelnuts, granulated sugar, cacao powder and salt and beat until a dough forms.
- Take mounds of the cookie dough, about 20 grams worth, and roll it in your hands until a ball forms. Place the balls on the cookie sheet spaced a little bit apart.
- Bake in the oven for 18 to 20 minutes. The cookies will be slightly golden and smell delicious. Let them cool for a few minutes before rolling them in icing sugar. The first lot of icing sugar will melt slightly. When completely cool, roll in the icing sugar a second time and if using, sprinkle with edible glitter. Your cookies are ready to enjoy.
Check out the rest of the Cookie Recipe Advent Calendar here!
The content, recipe and all photos used in this blog post belong to Stuart / Cakeyboi and were used with his permission. Please do not reprint any of the content in this post without his express permission.
