Gluten Free Mexican Wedding Cakes
RECIPE IDEA: Gluten Free Mexican Wedding Cakes
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Hi. It’s Lois in the kitchen at Recipe Idea Shop. There are lots of names for these Gluten Free Mexican Wedding Cakes (which are really cookies). Don’s family called them “Spanish Wedding Cakes.” My mother called them “Pecan Balls.” But they are also known as “Nut Butter Balls” and “Russian Tea Cakes.”
Some folks stick with the basic Mexican Wedding Cakes recipe using vanilla as the flavoring; others substitute a tablespoon of bourbon, brandy or rum for the vanilla. I’m a purist, and I use vanilla—mostly because I have another amazing Bourbon Ball recipe.
This year when I made them, I wanted them gluten free, so I substituted my favorite gluten free baking flour, Bob’s Red Mill All Purpose Gluten Free Baking Mix, for the normal wheat flour, and voila! Gluten Free Mexican Wedding Cakes. If you prefer to use regular flour instead of gluten free, simply substitute an equal amount of a good all-purpose flour, like King Arthur Organic Unbleached Flour (which I personally think is one of the best), for the gluten free flour in the recipe. Also eliminate the Bob’s Red Mill Xanthan Gum.
I’m sure you won’t be able to tell that the Gluten Free Mexican Wedding Cakes are gluten free. They taste exactly the same to me. But watch out! When you eat them, you are likely to get powdered sugar and crumbs all down the front of yourself. So eat them over a plate or napkin. The cookie is compact, but crumbly. And one fantastic thing about them is that they are only 65 calories per cookie!
Read on for recipe and nutrition…
- 2 sticks of butter (16 T)
- 4 T powdered sugar (or 6 T granulated sugar)
- 1 t vanilla
- 1/4 t salt
- 2 cups [url href=”https://amzn.to/1HQSReS”]Bob’s Red Mill All Purpose Gluten Free Baking Flour[/url]
- 1 t [url href=”https://amzn.to/1HQSzEH”]Bob’s Red Mill Xanthan Gum[/url]
- 2 cups chopped pecans
- 1 cup powdered sugar, for rolling
- Cream the butter, sugar, vanilla and salt.
- Add Xanthin Gum and the flour, a little at a time, until fully incorporated. The dough will be very crumbly looking.
- Mix in the pecans.
- Pinch off a small piece of dough and squeeze it to compact it, then roll it into a 1″ ball.
- The cookies do not expand when baking them, so you can place them as close as 1/2″ apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. I get 35 cookies per cookie sheet (7 rows of 5 cookies).
- Bake at 325F degrees for 8-12 minutes until they are just starting to turn a little brown.
- Roll the hot cookies in a bowl of powdered sugar to cover them. The sugar sticks well on the hot cookies.
- If you prefer a light coating of sugar, wait to roll them until the cookies have cooled slightly.
Gluten Free Mexican Wedding Cakes Nutrition Label. A serving is one cookie.