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Greek Wedding Cookies take less than an hour to make, use simple pantry ingredients, and are so crumbly, soft, and tasty! Perfect for the special occasions and the holidays. Enjoy them with your family, or give them as a gift!
What’s a Greek wedding cookie?
Kourabiedes or kourabiethes, are a shortbread cookies with sweet, buttery flavor and a soft, crumbly texture. They’re also known as Greek wedding cookies, butter cookies, and Christmas cookies. These sweet butter cookies are popular for events and holidays – especially Christmas!
Greek Butter Cookies
I love, love, love baking cookies for the holidays!
Admittedly, there was a point in my life where I was not much of a baker. But, homemade cookies are irresistible, and as my kids were growing up, I knew I wanted to learn how to make special desserts for them just like I did with our Sunday suppers.
Cookies were easiest for me to start with, and after all my years of experimenting, I developed plenty of cookie recipes.
Now, some of my favorites include my coconut cookies, pumpkin frosting cookies, no-bake oatmeal cookies, oatmeal raisin cookies, chocolate chip, and double-chocolate!
Greek Wedding Cookie Ingredients
- Almonds: Almond is a key ingredient in Greek wedding cookies, contributing majorly to the flavor. I’m using ground almonds.
- Butter: You will want to use unsalted butter. This is important, as this recipe should not have added salt. The butter should be soft enough to cream, but still cold. Don’t let it get too warm!
- Powdered Sugar: You will need this both for the cookie mixture and for rolling the cookies in sugar later.
- Egg: You only need an egg yolk, so separate the egg white from the yolk and only keep the yolk.
- Vanilla Extract: Vanilla and almond go together so well. I love adding vanilla extract to my Greek cookies. You can also use Mexican vanilla extract.
- All-Purpose Flour: For the dough!
- Baking Powder: This lightens the texture of the cookies.
How to Make Wedding Cookies
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- Spread ground almonds in a shallow baking pan. Toast for 6-8 minutes or until lightly browned. Reduce oven heat to 325°F.
- In a bowl, cream butter until light and fluffy. Add egg yolk and 2 Tablespoons powdered sugar, and mix well. Stir in almonds and vanilla extract.
- In a bowl, combine flour and baking powder. Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture, mixing together until smooth.
- Pinch off walnut-sized pieces of dough and shape them into crescents. Add them to a non-greased baking sheet, spacing the cookies 1-inch apart.
- Bake for 30 minutes, or until very lightly browned. Allow the cookies to cool on racks for 5 minutes after removing from the oven.
- Sift half of 3 cups powdered sugar over wax paper. Transfer the cookies to it. Sift the remaining powdered sugar over the cookies to coat them. Let them stand until cooled, then store in an airtight container until ready to enjoy.
Greek Cookies Expert Tips
- Greek wedding cookies can be rolled into a few shapes, but I like to make mine in a crescent shape.
- You might need to bake them for a few extra minutes if you form them in a large ball shape, since they will most likely turn out larger than the crescents shown here.
- You can also use almond extract if you don’t want to use real almonds. I would recommend that for this you halve the vanilla extract and use half almond extract instead, or use all almond extract.
- Avoid over-working your dough, which can make the cookies too dense.
Greek Butter Cookies FAQ
Although both Greek wedding cookies (kourabiedes) and Greek honey cookies (melomakarona) are typically served for holidays like Christmas, they are very different. Melomakarona cookies are moist honey cookies with spices and a less crumbly texture.
If your Greek cookies come out of the oven flat, then you might have over-worked the dough or your butter was too warm. I recommend making sure your butter is still somewhat cold, and don’t overwork your dough.
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Recipe
Greek Wedding Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup ground almonds
- 1 cup unsalted butter softened
- 2 Tablespoons powdered sugar for the cookie mixture
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1.5 teaspoons baking powder
- 3 cups powdered sugar for topping the cookies
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- Spread ground almonds in a shallow baking pan. Toast for 6-8 minutes or until lightly browned. Reduce oven heat to 325°F.1 cup ground almonds
- In a bowl, cream butter until light and fluffy. Add egg yolk and 2 Tablespoons powdered sugar, and mix well. Stir in almonds and vanilla extract.1 cup unsalted butter, 2 Tablespoons powdered sugar, 1 egg yolk, 1 Tablespoon vanilla extract, 1 cup ground almonds
- In a bowl, combine flour and baking powder. Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture, mixing together until smooth.2 cups all-purpose flour, 1.5 teaspoons baking powder
- Pinch off walnut-sized pieces of dough and shape them into crescents. Add them to a non-greased baking sheet, spacing the cookies 1-inch apart.
- Bake for 30 minutes, or until very lightly browned. Allow the cookies to cool on racks for 5 minutes after removing from the oven.
- Sift half of 3 cups powdered sugar over wax paper. Transfer the cookies to it. Sift the remaining powdered sugar over the cookies to coat them. Let them stand until cooled, then store in an airtight container until ready to enjoy.3 cups powdered sugar
Notes
- Try different shapes: You can shape these cookies into balls, oblong footballs, or larger crescents. Just remember, if you’re shaping them into larger balls, they may require a few more minutes of baking time than our smaller crescents.
- Make it into a food gift: Try giving these as food presents! Put in a mason jar with a festive ribbon, and these cookies make an excellent holiday food gift.
Trish says
Please clarify: Baking soda is listed in the ingredients. However, baking powder is referenced in the recipe instructions. Looks like a delicious recipe. Even better, I actually have a bottle of Ouzo on hand! Looking forward to your response. -Trish
Em Beitel says
Trish, thank you for your comment! It’s meant to be baking powder – we appreciate you pointing out that discrepancy and have fixed it. We are looking forward to hearing how you like it!