Italian Bakery Cookies
I began searching for a recipe to replicate those yummy little sprinkle cookies you find in a bakery after I made sugar cookies with sprinkles and was left thinking about those almondy soft sprinkle cookies you get from the bakery! After a lot of reading about the cookies and their highly guarded recipe, I noticed a few foodie detectives had discovered that almond paste was the secret ingredient. So I began searching for a recipe that included almond paste. After reading through several different recipes, I finally found one that looked like it would produce a tender and flavorful cookie.
2sisters2cities had also searched high and low for the recipe, and found it on non other than…YouTube. A rogue baker had given away the bakeries secret recipe..haha jk. A bakery owner in Jersey shared it. Thank you Gretchen Price, for this wonderous cookie recipe 🙌🏽.
Almond paste and butter give them flavor, powdered sugar makes for a tender cookie, and 4 egg whites give the cookie its structure. This recipe turns out a tender cookie with that classic almond flavor you get from that little Italian bakery on tha corna.
I tweaked the preparation of the recipe to allow for the use of cold butter because I almost always decide to make cookies on the fly, and never have softened butter. I got the idea from Smitten Kitchen (an amazing food blogger from my homeland NYC). She makes her sugar cookies using the food processor so the butter doesn’t need softening! Brilliant! I found this also helps to incorporate the almond paste evenly. If you want to use a stand mixer, soften the almond paste for 8 seconds in the microwave covered in a damp paper towel, then break into pieces and beat with paddle attachment until broken up as much as possible. If you have a food processor, I would definitely just recommend using that for this recipe. I converted the measurements to cups (if you don’t have a scale) and added a measurement for the salt which originally said “a pinch”.
We decorated these cookies with halloween sprinkles because ‘tis the season, but you are welcome to go the more classic route with a glacéed cherry on each, or some rainbow sprinkles or even chocolate chips! A cookie press is easier to use but if you don’t have one, I have used a piping bag to make these, which wouldn’t have been too bad if I didn’t have a 7 month old strapped to my body during the piping process. If you do decide to pipe, get a large pastry bag fitted with a star pastry tube (#7) or a cookie press. A smaller star tip would also work, just pipe the dough into roughly 2 inch circles.
Recipe Adapted from 2sisters2cities, by Tierney Larson
Servings: This recipe makes about 90 cookies from a cookie press.
Ingredients:
3 oz almond paste (about 1/4 of a stick)
7 oz butter (1 3/4 a stick) cut into 8 pieces
7 oz shortening (1 and 1/4 cup plus 1 tsp)
5.9 oz confectioners sugar (1 cup plus 2 tbl)
4 egg whites
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp kosher salt
16oz All purpose flour (3 1/4 cups)
1- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. If using a cookie press, you do not need to line your cookie sheets with anything, this will make it easier to use the cookie press, and to pipe the cookies if you don’t have a press.
2-Whisk together the flour and salt in a medium bowl and set aside.
3- In the bowl of a food processor, add the almond paste and process until you get a sandy texture. *don’t skip this step or the almond paste will never incorporate correctly.
4- Add the cubed butter, shortening and sugar and process for about 30 seconds, then scrape down any sugar still around the bowl and then process for another 30 seconds. The almond paste might still be visible lumps, that’s okay.
5- Add the egg whites one at a time, streaming them in while the processor is on, and scraping down the bowl now and then. Then add the vanilla and almond extracts and process for another 30 seconds until fully combined.
6- Add the flour and salt mixture in 3 batches, pulsing and using a spatula in between to scrape down sides and stir in flour that’s on top. The last batch will have some flour left on top, just transfer the dough to a large bowl and stir to incorporate the last bits of flour.
7- Spoon the dough into your cookie press (or piping bag) and press cookies onto an un-greased baking sheet. If piping: pipe cookies to roughly 2 inches in diameter by starting in the center and piping them into a circle shape working from the inside out.
8- Top with sprinkles, chocolate chips or glacéed cherries.
9- Bake cookies for 7-9 minutes rotating the pan half way through. The cookies should be lightly golden on the bottom and edges.
10- Transfer to a rack to cool. Store cookies in an airtight container.
