Today we are sharing what many of you were waiting for…One of the best Spanish Christmas sweets, the recipe for polvorones cookies!
Don´t get to addicted as these Spanish desserts are good for your happiness but not so good for your diet.
Recipe for polvorones cookies
Since you all are too excited to learn how to make them, we are going directly to the best recipe for polvorones cookies, including its ingredients and the best tips to do it. But if you are interested in learning information and the best facts about polvorones, you can find it after the traditional polvorones recipe:
Ingredients for polvoron
The Ingredients to make polvorones cookies are:
- 500 g Plain flour
- 235 g Pork lard (or butter)
- 3/4 cup raw almonds
- 3/4 Icing sugar
- 1 or 2 Tbsp cinnamon
How to make polvorones
Follow the list step by step to learn how to make polvorones:
- Preheat oven to 350 F (180 C)
- Pour flour into a cookie sheet and toast it in the oven for about 8 minutes (Stirring it at times)
- On another baking tray, place almonds and toast them until they look golden (8-10 min)
- Remove the almonds and grind them into a flour-like texture with a food processor. Reduce oven temperature to 250 F (120C).
- In a big mixing bowl, combine the butter (or pork lard), cinnamon and sugar with an electronic or hand whisk (until it looks creamy)
- Add the almonds and the flour to the butter (or pork lard) mixture and put it all together into a dough (it´s okay if it looks breakable)
- Place a sheet of waxed paper on a flat work area (cutting board for exaple). In top of it, try to make the shape of a ball with the dough. With a rolling pin transform it into a rectangle. (4cm thickness)
- Cut the dough in circular pieces (cookies) and then move the cookies to a baking tray. (Use a spatula if you don´t want to break them)
- Bake them for about 30 minutes until they look golden on the borders.
- Let it cool in the baking tray before moving them (optional to add icing sugar and cinnamon for decoration)
- Your Spanish polvoron recipe is done! Now it´s ready to serve!
What are polvorones??
The polvorones are Spanish Christmas cookies, a sweet you will find everywhere if you visit Spain during wintertime. These traditional holiday cookies have crumby texture and an almond flavour
(*alert for allergic* There are polvorones without almonds).
If you were wondering where does the word polvoron come from, polvo means dust in English. It will make more sense when you try it, but basically these mantecado Spanish Christmas sweets will fall apart in dust when you eat them.
Where to buy polvorones?
Honestly, now you can buy polvorones everywhere you want if you are in Spain. Even if you go to big markets like Mercadona or Carrefour you will find the typical polvorones. (Only in Christmas time)
If you are looking for the most famous ones, you should know that in areas of Spain like Malaga or Valladolid, they are known for having delicious polvorones cookies. The pasteleria Lepanto in Málaga or Moulin Chocolat in Madrid are very famous pastry shops for polvorones.
If you can´t make it to Spain, now there are online shops that can send polvorones to your countries.
Different polvoron flavours
Although the traditional Spanish polvoron is made of almond, now you can find many different types. If you want to do a chocolate version for example you just need to add 1/2 cup of grated chocolate. Or a tablespoon of lemon zest to make the Polvoron of lemon.
The favourite polvoron flavours for Spaniards are coco, lemon or cinnamon.
Spanish polvorones history
Like many other Spanish desserts, the origin of polvorones comes from the Moors. Of course, the Arab dessert didn´t have pork and it was the Spaniards who included it on the recipe.
The Spanish Inquisition, to prove if you were catholic or not, added the pork fat. That way they would discover the Muslims or Jews who would never eat pork.
Polvoron calories
Hope you are happy now that you know the recipe for polvorones cookies, because it´s time for bad news. Everyone loves the polvorones from Spain, but it will for sure break your diet. Just one polvoron has 127 calories!
Enjoy the polvorones cookies!
That´s all the information you need to know about these Spanish Christmas cookies. Hope you learned the recipe for polvorones cookies and if you have any suggestion to make them better, let us know!!