The Lakeview librarian’s wedding cakes

A great little recipe by Mary Riehle, who teaches knitting at the Lakeview branch of the Oakland Public Library. She’s also published a book of Christmas cookie recipes. Here’s her recipe for Mexican Wedding Cakes (also called “Russian Tea Cakes”).

Mexican Wedding Cakes

Ingredients

• 1 cup butter
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 2 cups flower
• 1 cup very finely chopped pecans
• A little vanilla extract

Here’s how you make these cakes, according to Marie:

1. Heat the oven to “300 or 325.”
2. “You just beat the butter and sugar really a lot so it’s completely dissolved.”
3. “Then you put in the flour.”
4. “Then put nuts in. I guess there must be some vanilla in there, too…”
5. “Then you roll them into little balls. I like ’em small.” Here Marie makes a circular formation with her index finger and thumb that another lady present describes as “about the size of an unshelled walnut.”
6. “Then you put them in the pan–they don’t grow. Use parchment paper.”
   Bake for “a half hour … You want it so when you pick them up they’re golden on the bottom and cooked through.”
7. “Take them out and roll them in powdered sugar. Do it while they’re hot. Do it fast–really fast.”
   Then, “once they are cool, do it again.”
8. “You have to store them in old tin things–the ones I save from year to year. There are a number of things you can put them in but no–you gotta put them in tins.”
   1. This recipe makes about seven dozen little cakes, according to Marie, which she wraps up in cellophane with nine other kinds of cookies and gives as gifts each Christmas season.