Perfectly Spiced Bite Size Cookie
Insanely popular in Denmark at Christmastime, these pebernødder are full of warm and delicious winter spices. They are amazingly crunchy and just so addicting, it’s hard not to eat a handful at a time! In our family, it wouldn’t be Christmas without these cookies. We have vivid memories of sitting down at the kitchen counter with our siblings and friends, donning our baking aprons, turning on Christmas music, and just rolling these cookies out for hours. Oh, and sneaking the dog a little piece of dough every once in a while!
Why are they called “Pepper Nuts?”
“Pebernødder” literally means “pepper nuts” (again, not the most appealing name when translated). But, it makes sense, since they contain white pepper and are small, brown, and crunchy, almost like hazelnuts. And historically, they were baked without the addition of any leavening agent, so they were extremely hard and crunchy. Now, we use leavening agents like baking powder to give the cookie more of a crispy texture, rather than hard.
Tips & Tricks
In the Danish recipe, the leavening agent of choice is actually hjortetaksalt, or ammonium bicarbonate. This gives the cookies the most amazing crunch and texture. We would probably prefer to use this, but it’s not easy to find in the US, so our recipe uses baking powder. If you do want to order some, here is where we usually get ours.
This recipe is simple and should not cause you any problems. As usual, we really would recommend you get a kitchen scale to use instead of cup measurements. Our recipes lend themselves a bit better to using grams (as you can see by the vast amounts of approximations in the recipe below lol). When you roll the dough into balls, try to keep them somewhat uniformly sized. If you don’t, you’ll get some smaller, much crispier cookies and some larger and softer ones. Have fun, and leave us a comment and a rating below if you try out the recipe!
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Pebernødder (Peppernut Cookies)
Ingredients
- 350 grams all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp white pepper
- 1/2 tsp ground ginger
- 1/2 tsp cloves
- Pinch of salt
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 113 grams unsalted butter, cold
- 150 grams brown sugar
- 100 ml milk or water
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350 F (175 C).
- Mix together your flour, cinnamon, white pepper, ginger, cloves, salt, and baking powder.
- Cube your cold butter and start to crumble together with the flour (like you would with pie dough). You can also do this in a food processor or using a pastry cutter!
- Once your mixture starts to resemble sand, you are ready for the next step.
- Add the brown sugar, breaking up the big clumps and incorporating it evenly into the mixture.
- Add in the milk/water and start kneading by hand until just combined.
- Note: it may seem very dry and crumbly to start. If you absolutely need to, you can add a little bit more milk or water for it to come together! By the end it should come together into one cohesive dough.
- Break off a large piece of the dough (probably about a quarter of the dough) and start to roll into a log, about 1cm or half an inch wide.
- Cut your log into small pieces, about 1-1.5cm in size. It helps to pinch the end of the log between the fingertips of your thumb and index finger and then cut at the end, then keep repeating to help keep the cuts even by using your fingers to measure.
- Start rolling your pieces into little balls. The key here is to try to keep all of them a consistent size! It can be tricky to do so in the beginning.
- Once your balls are rolled, place them on a parchment lined baking sheet with a bit of space between. They will puff up slightly.
- Bake for 10-15 minutes until golden brown around the edges and crunchy! Place on a cooling rack to fully cool down.
- Repeat with the remaining dough until you've used it all! You can bake multiple baking sheets at once if you like, but we find that in the time it takes for one batch to bake, you'll only just have prepared the next baking sheet for the oven anyway.
- Once cooled down, store in a cookie tin. Enjoy throughout the holiday season!
I love the smell these little beauty’s leave behind in my kitchen! Thank you for the amazing recipe
Thank you for the lovely comment and for using our recipe! 🙂
Just tried these out for the first time, and didn’t know what to expect. These are great! A really fun snacking cookie with a unique taste. Thank you for sharing!
They are a bit strange for a Christmas cookie, aren’t they? Although I suppose quite common in northern Europe, but strange elsewhere in the world 🙂 Anyway, thanks for using our recipe and leaving a comment, it’s very much appreciated!