Buttery and nutty melt-in-your-mouth shortbread surrounds a soft, fruity middle. These almond thumbprint cookies are topped with the jelly of your choice. I like to use strawberry jelly but raspberry would be just as delicious. They’re the perfect Christmas cookie!
What are Almond Thumbprint Cookies?
Classic shortbread recipes involve one part sugar, two parts butter, and three parts flour. We are taking it a step further by adding an egg yolk, ground almonds, and pure almond extract for a more golden texture and a rich, nutty flavor. The shortbread dough is indented with your thumb and filled with a favorite jelly, or in this batch, leftover apple butter.
How to Add Almond Flavor
We’ll be adding ground almonds into the shortbread base as well as almond extract. To make 1/2 cup ground almonds, put 2/3 cup whole almonds in a food processor and whirl them around for 30 seconds until they resemble coarse breadcrumbs. If you process the almonds too long, they will release their oil and create almond butter. Although yummy, not what we want.
How to Make Almond Thumbprint Cookies
Step 1 – Make Dough
Beat together unsalted butter, salt, almond extract, granulated sugar and egg yolk on medium speed until smooth. Next, slowly add all-purpose flour and your ground almonds until you have a stiff dough.
Step 2- Divide Dough into Long Rolls and Refrigerate
On a lightly floured surface, divide the dough into two eight-inch long rolls and refrigerate them for at least one hour. While they’re in the refrigerator preheat your oven to 320˚ F. Slice each roll 1/2 inch thick and lay them on a greased cookie sheet.
Step 3 – Create Thumbprints
Using your thumb, make an indentation into the middle of each slice. The depth of the indentation is up to you. I don’t like to go really deep because I like a little bit of jelly on top of my cookie, but if you prefer a flatter end result you can really create a deep divot with your thumb.
Step 4 – Add Jam
Spread 1/2 teaspoon jelly, jam or fruit butter into the indentation. A baby spoon works great for this!
Step 5 – Bake the Cookies
Bake the cookies for 12 minutes or until golden on edges. While still warm, dust the cookies with the extra granulated sugar.
This Christmas, these are the perfect complement to any cookie platter. They’re rich, nutty and absolutely addicting. Serve with a tall glass of milk or a hot cup of coffee. Enjoy!
Cookie Tips and FAQ
Refrigerate your dough for at least one hour. Keep dough that you’re not baking, in the refrigerator until you’re ready to slice it.
Because of the texture of the dough, your almond thumbprint cookies may sometimes crack. To avoid this make sure roll out the dough smooth. When removing from the oven, if you find a crack you can simply press it back together.
You can add any jam you feel would compliment the almond flavor. Strawberry, blackbery and raspberry are our favorite combinations.
More Cookie Recipes
- Soft Peanut Butter Cookies – my favorite!
- Pecan Sandies Cookies Recipe – thick like shortbread!
- Healthy Cookie Recipe – a healthier cookie.
Almond Jelly Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter softened
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon almond extract
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar plus 2 Tablespoons
- 1 egg yolk
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup ground almonds
- 1/2 cup favorite jelly
Instructions
- Create ground almonds by placing whole, raw almonds into a blender or food processor until they resemble bread crumbs.
- In a mixer, beat the butter, salt, extract, sugar and egg yolk until smooth. Add flour and ground almonds and knead into a firm dough. Divide the dough into two rolls approximately 3 inches in diameter. Refrigerate the dough for at least one hour.
- Preheat your oven to 320˚ F.
- Slice the dough rolls 1/2 inch thick and press a thumbprint into each one. Place 1/2 teaspoon jelly into each thumbprint.
- Bake the cookies on greased baking sheets for 12 minutes or until golden on edges. Dust the cookies with the extra 2 Tablespoons of granulated sugar while warm.
Notes
Nutrition
This recipe was originally shared in December 2015. The pictures have been updated to better reflect the recipe. The recipe itself remains the same.
Comments & Reviews
These were delicious. I think the recipe is fine itself but maybe can we have the sizing of how large the logs should be before we cut them? I halved the batch and got 10 only instead of 18 and they were quite small still.. Other than that I loved the recipe. Thank you so much for sharing!! Will definitely make these all the time.
These turned out wonderful, it has the best flavor. A word to the wise, however, I had to make a few modifications. The suggested amount of almonds to ground for the recipe isn’t right. The suggested 2/3 cup of whole almonds is way too much. It would appear to be a 1:1 ratio; 1/2 cup whole almonds to get 1/2 cup ground almonds. Next, maybe don’t fix this on a cold day or in a cool kitchen. The butter kept not mixing well with the flour and almonds and it just acted like breadcrumbs. So I ended up microwaving it like 30-40 seconds at half power, stirring once in a while and that really helped. The butter finally softened up nicely and I was finally able to shape them into rolls. I put it in the fridge as recipe says but next time I’ll probably skip that and just start slicing. This is much more dense than sugar cookie dough. Also, I would go ahead and use 1/2 cup of sugar in the batter. That’s what I did and it came out nicely sweet, delicate even. I used peach preserves and it was excellent. I also cooked these at 350 for 12-15 minutes.