Kev had to work on Saturday.  After an attempt to convince Ellis that he could not go to work with hisDada (his lack of language skills preclude him from announcing the winners of an art award), we deciding the only way to console our collective misery was to bake cookies.

Pecan Butter Biscuits from Apples for Jam

Ellis liked the cookies.  But, the butter cream frosting was hoovered off of 6 of them.  This has happened many times before, frosting disappears around my two year old and it is a trait that comes directly from my father.  A chronic mid-night snacker, we would wake up in the morning to find he'd eaten the entire top-half of what ever dessert my mother had made the day before.  Personally, I like some cake (or cookie) with my frosting.  Ellis obviously isn't so inclined.

Incidentally, this midnight snacking habit of dad's was the reason I wasn't very popular as a sleep-over host.  A friend told me not so long ago that she didn't like staying at mine because "whenever we'd try and sneak out in the middle of the night, there he'd be, in his tighty whities with crumbs in his chest hair".  I can confirm it was the most effective deterrent to sneaking out that exists on the planet for teenage girls.

Anyway, these delicious cookies are unbearably more-ish.  We made one batch with pecans and a second batch with cashews, which resulted in the lightest, butteriest cookies ever...and the frosting was good too.

Pecan Butter Cookies

Ingredients:

COOKIES

220g (1 cup) Butter, softened

70g (1/2 cup) icing sugar

1t Vanilla Extract

280g (2 1/2 cups) Plain Flour

70g (2.5 oz) chopped pecans

ICING:

250g (2 cups) Icing Sugar

30g (2T) softened Butter

1t Vanilla extract

2T Milk

A few drops of food colouring

Preheat oven to 190C/350F Cream butter, sugar and vanilla until smooth. Add flour in four portions, mashing it in well with a wooden spoon after each addition.  Mix the nuts through.

Divide the dough into quarters.  Dip your fingers in icing sugar, then from each quarter of dough, roll 10 balls the size of cherry tomatoes.  Put on 2 cookie sheets, leaving some space between each ball.  Flatten each one a bit, then dip you thumb in icing sugar and make an indent in each ball.

Bake one tray at a time for about 15 minutes or until they are firm and golden and slightly darker around the edges. Wait until they are completely cool to ice.

To make the icing, cream together the icing sugar, butter, vanilla and milk until completely smooth.  You may need to add more or less milk to get a nice butter consistency. Add the food colouring (if you wish)