Butterball Cookies

It's not very often that I'll say I can't wait till all my kids are home from school.. believe me, they are a busy and loud crowd! But this past Thanksgiving holiday I had them home for a whole week.. and "I didn't go crazy", do in part to my husband taking a week off his busy schedule and I not having to drive four kids to three different schools and childhood activities! We had so much fun playing family games and sporting activities (my idea of sporting these days is Wii), baking, cooking and sipping warm drinks by the fire, because we finally had some holiday weather!

I had a wonderful Thanksgiving, very busy, very filling and I'm happy to say we don't have Turkey for Christmas! :)
So this past week began the season of cookie baking and decorating. Tuesday I spent the day at my folks house making some family favorites and reminiscing with my mom of Christmas' past. As my mom had ingredients to go and her arms in dough.. as my dad had said, we had a day filled with holiday cheer.

This cookie recipe is a favorite of not just my Italian family, but there are renditions of these all over the world. This is where I might hear from my Italian amici (friends) that I am calling them by something there not. My mom and sister's call them Butterball Cookies.. so that is what I call them. Although, I found myself wanting to declare them as the perfect snowball.. not like the wet and hard packed kind.. these melt in your mouth and you won't want to toss them!

Please let me know what you traditionally call them and we can all enjoy these butterballs with hot cocoa, tea or espresso!
Ciao and saluto to the holiday season!
Laurie

Ingredients
1 cup butter at room temperature
½ cup + 4 tablespoons powdered sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2 ¼ cups flour
¼ tsp. salt
¾ cups blanched and chopped almonds

Directions
Cream the butter and 4 tablespoons of the powdered sugar together. Add vanilla.
Mix together flour and salt. Blend with a wooden spoon into the sugar and butter mix. Mix well. Add the almonds and mix.
Chill dough for half an hour. Prepare a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Preheat oven to 350°. Roll dough into walnut sized balls. Place on cookie sheet about a ½ inch apart. These cookies do not expand so you can get many on a sheet.

Bake in preheated oven for 20 minutes.
Roll immediately in powdered sugar. When cookies are cool roll in powdered sugar again.