Makes about 3 dozen cookies
AS MUCH AS I WRITE IN PRAISE OF QUICK RECIPES, DURING THE HOLIDAYS I’M A sucker for the kind of baking that requires a bit of shaping and care. Even better if said recipe can be turned into a holiday tradition that calls people to a table and everyone sits around sharing the work, gabbing all the while. These traditions are all too often lost these days, and I’d like to bring them back. I recall a friend from New York who returns home to Ohio every Christmas to her mother’s house, and on the second day after she arrives, they have a family baking day, where they churn out dozens upon dozens of cookies together. The stuff of cozy holiday baking dreams.
So if you’re thinking this sort of thing might be nice to instill in your own household, might I suggest Norwegian sandbakkels as a way to get started? These crisp, buttery sugar cookies (translated as “sand tarts” but also sometimes called “butter tarts”) can be eaten straight up, or filled with cream and berries or chocolate or whatever makes your skirt fly up. The dough couldn’t be easier, and the fun part comes in the shaping of the shell-like cookies by pressing small hunks of dough into little fluted tins. You can easily find new sets of tins online, often with pretty shapes imprinted in them, and occasionally I’ll come across small vintage boxes of round, traditionally shaped ones in thrift stores.
8 ounces/225 g unsalted European-style butter, at room temperature
½ cup/60 g confectioners’ sugar
¼ cup/57 g light brown sugar
¼ cup/50 g granulated sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2¼ to 2½ cups/288 to 320 g unbleached all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
½ teaspoon fine sea salt
Nonstick cooking spray for tins
Spoonable Vanilla Custard (here), whipped cream, berries for serving (optional)
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium-high speed until creamy, about 30 seconds. Add the confectioners’ sugar, brown sugar, and granulated sugar and continue to beat until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce the mixer speed to medium and beat in the egg and vanilla. Reduce the mixer speed to low and stir in the flour and salt. Scrape down the bowl well and make sure the dough is well mixed. Cover the bowl tightly and refrigerate the dough until very firm, about 2 hours.
Position racks to the upper and lower thirds of the oven and preheat it to 375°F/190°C. Spritz the interiors of a set of sandbakkels tins or other decorative mini (2-inch/5 cm) tart tins with a little nonstick cooking spray. Pinch off walnut-size pieces of the dough and place each in a prepared tin, pressing them evenly across the bottom and up the sides of the tins. (Set aside the remaining dough until after each batch of cookies are baked, as you will be reusing the tins.) Place the filled tins, spaced about 2 inches apart, on baking sheets. Bake until the cookies are golden, 8 to 10 minutes, rotating the sheets from front to back and top to bottom halfway through the baking time.
Line a work surface with newspaper or brown paper grocery bags. When the tins come out of the oven, allow them to cool on the paper for 2 or 3 minutes. Invert the tins onto the paper, and give the bottom of each tin a few taps with your fingertips to encourage the cookies to release from the tins. Let the cookies cool completely on the paper. Allow the tins to cool as well, before shaping the next batch with the remaining dough.
Eat sandbakkels straight up, or fill with custard, whipped cream, and/or berries. The baked cookies will keep in an airtight container in layers separated by parchment paper for up to 1 week.