Walnut Cookies — Something to Put in the Tin Beside the Matcha Shortbread

December. The matcha shortbread goes into the oven and the apartment enters its winter mode: lights and candles and the smell of butter and green tea and the particular warmth that December brings to a kitchen that has been cooking all year and is now, in December, cooking harder, cooking with purpose, cooking for the holidays and the gifting and the people who will receive a tin of matcha shortbread and will taste, in each cookie, the love that went into the mixing and the rolling and the cutting.

I made kuromame early this year — started December 1st, because the two-day process needs room in the schedule and December's schedule is already full. The nail went into the pot. The beans went into the water. The soaking began. The two-day vigil: checking the beans, adjusting the heat, adding water, waiting. The kuromame is the meditation. The kuromame is the practice of patience applied to legumes. The legumes do not care about my schedule. The legumes soak at their own pace. The pace is the lesson.

Miya is participating in the kuromame for the first time this year — not just watching but doing, standing on her stool, stirring the pot, checking the color of the beans. She asked about the nail: "Why is there a nail in the beans?" I said, "The iron turns the beans black." She said, "Science!" She is right. It is science. It is also tradition. It is also grief. It is also love. The nail is all four things simultaneously, and the simultaneously is the Japanese way, and the Japanese way is my way, and my way is the only way I know to make kuromame that is glossy and black and sweet and exactly right.

Brian asked if Miya could spend Christmas Eve with him and Lisa this year — a change from the usual calendar, because Lisa's family is visiting from out of state and the celebration is on Christmas Eve. I said yes. The yes was easy. The yes was the co-parenting working. The yes was: my daughter has another family now, and the other family wants her on Christmas Eve, and the wanting is love, and love from any direction is good for a child. I will have Christmas morning. The morning is enough. The morning is the tamagoyaki and the miso soup and the chipped bowl. The morning is the ritual. The ritual does not need Christmas Eve. The ritual needs only the morning.

The matcha shortbread fills one tin, but December always calls for two — one to keep, one to give. These walnut cookies have become the second cookie in my holiday rotation precisely because they ask so little of me: no nail in the pot, no two-day vigil, no science lesson required. Just butter and sugar and walnuts and the kind of quiet, uncomplicated baking that balances out the weeks when everything else — the kuromame, the schedule, the calendar negotiations — demands so much of you at once.

Walnut Cookies

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 12 min | Total Time: 27 min | Servings: 24 cookies

Ingredients

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar, plus more for rolling
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup finely chopped walnuts

Instructions

1. Preheat oven. Heat your oven to 350°F (175°C). Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
2. Cream butter and sugar. Beat the softened butter and 1/2 cup powdered sugar together with a hand mixer or stand mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 2–3 minutes. Mix in the vanilla extract.
3. Add dry ingredients. Reduce speed to low and gradually mix in the flour and salt until just combined. Fold in the chopped walnuts with a spatula or wooden spoon.
4. Shape the cookies. Roll the dough into 1-inch balls and place them about 1 inch apart on the prepared baking sheets. They will not spread much.
5. Bake. Bake for 11–13 minutes, until the bottoms are just lightly golden and the tops are set but still pale. Do not overbake — they should remain tender.
6. Roll in powdered sugar. Let the cookies cool for 5 minutes on the pan. While still warm, gently roll each cookie in powdered sugar to coat. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely, then roll in powdered sugar a second time for a fuller coating.
7. Store or gift. Layer in a tin between sheets of parchment. These keep well at room temperature for up to 10 days, making them ideal for gifting.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 148 | Protein: 2g | Fat: 10g | Carbs: 13g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 26mg