Categories: Cookies

Ingredients

• 1 cup softened butter
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 Tablespoon instant coffee powder or espresso powder
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 13/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 11/2 cups finely chopped pecans, walnuts, or hazelnuts
• powdered sugar to coat the baked cookies

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F., rack in the middle position

2. Soften the butter. Mix in the white sugar, vanilla extract, instant coffee powder, cocoa, and salt.

3. Add the flour in half-cup increments, mixing after each addition. (You don’t have to be exact. It won’t come out even anyway! Just make sure the flour is added in three parts.)

4. Stir in the nuts. Do your best to make sure that they’re evenly distributed.

5. Form the dough into one-inch balls (just pat them into shape with your fingers) and place them on an ungreased baking sheet, 12 to a standard sheet. Press them down very slightly (they’re supposed to look like balls, but you don’t want them to roll off on their way to the oven.)

6. Bake the cookie balls at 325 degrees F., for 12 to 15 minutes, until they are set. (Mine took 14 minutes.)

7. Move the cookies from the cookie sheet to a wire rack. Let them cool on the rack completely.

8. When the cookies are completely cool, dip them in powdered sugar to coat them. (If you roll them in powdered sugar while they’re still warm, they have a tendency to break apart.) Let them rest for several minutes on the wire rack and then store them in a cookie jar or a covered container.

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