The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap

Today I have a very special post for you.  This year, I decided to take part in a blog community cookie swap.  This is part of the reason that I love being a blogger – there is so much community support and interaction.  It’s great!

The idea behind the cookie swap was simple: each blogger sends out 3 dozen cookies and, in return, receives a dozen cookies from 3 different bloggers.  This was a fantastic way to meet new bloggers (and taste their yummy creations) and celebrate the holidays.

A special thank you to Lindsay over at Love and Olive Oil and Julie of The Little Kitchen for organizing such a fantastically-fun event!

I contemplated baking a healthy cookie for the swap, but I’m known in my family for making a special cookie each year, so I decided to pass on those little goodies to my assigned cookie swap receivers and will now pass on the recipe to you!

These nut-horn cookies were a special treat that my Dad’s side of the family always had at Christmastime when I was little.  A few years back, I decided to go on a hunt for the perfect nut-horn recipe and after a few taste tests, came up with a recipe that I felt was just right.  Since then,  I’ve started bringing these cookies to family holiday parties and get-togethers with friends and they have soon become a well-requested little dessert.

RECIPE:  NUT-HORN COOKIES

Ingredients (cookie batter):

• 8 oz Butter, at room temperature
• 8 oz Cream Cheese, at room temperature
• 1/2 C. Powdered sugar (plus more for dusting)
• 3 C. Flour
• 1 1/4 Tsp. Baking powder
• 1/4 Tsp. Salt

Ingredients (cookie filling):

• 16 oz Walnuts
• 1 Egg white
• 1/4 Tsp. Cinnamon
• 3/4 C. Sugar
• 2 Tbsp. butter

Instructions:

1.  Combine the butter and cream cheese until smooth.  Incorporate the powdered sugar, baking powder and salt to the mix.  Finally, add the flour to the cookie batter until just combined.  Do not over-mix.

2.  Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and chill for at least 1 hour, and up to 1 day.

3.  For the filling, pulse the walnuts in a food processor until they are chopped into very small pieces.  Do not over-process (you don’t want to end up with walnut butter).  Add the egg white, cinnamon, sugar and butter to the walnuts.  Stir to coat the nuts in the mixture.

4.  Roll the dough out to 1/4 inch thickness.  From the dough cut medium-sized squares (~2 x 2 inches).  You can use a cookie cutter to insure that all of the cookies are the same size.

5.  Place cookie filling in a narrow line along one of the diagonals of the square.  Fold the unfilled diagonal in to form the “horn.”

6.  Bake cookies on a nonstick sheet at 400°F until lightly browned on the bottom (about 10 minutes).

7.  Cool on a wire rack and dust with powdered sugar.

ENJOY!

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Then clean up your messy kitchen

I boxed my cookies up in red Christmas tins with red and green bows and a special Shabbott’s Habit label.

Three cookie packages under my NYC (i.e., very tiny) Christmas tree.

All ready to be sent to:

1. Kristen at A Healthy Balance

2. Georgie at Georgie Cakes

3. Erin at Erin Food Files

I hope that you enjoyed them!

And what wonderful cookies did I receive?

1)  These Amaaaaaazing chocolate sandwich cookies (with malted milk chocolate buttercream) from Julie over at Love and Olive Oil.  I loved that these cookies had a hint of salt.  It paired so well with the chocolate.

2)  Fantastic chocolate bourbon-filled chocolate chip cookies from Tripp over at It’s Tripp.  Bourbon + chocolate = Heaven.  I don’t think that needs any further explanation

3)  Sugar cookies with ginger that had just the right amount of zing from Margaret Farmer.  My husband couldn’t stop eating these.

Thanks to everyone who sent cookies my way!