Mexican Cinnamon Cookies

Happy Monday! I hope everyone had a wonderful Mother's Day yesterday - all you moms, all you friends of moms, all you teachers and nurses and doctors and amazing folks who help moms do what we do.  I hope you all gave yourselves a big hug yesterday, realizing what an amazing job you do every day, growing the next generation.

Being the second Monday of the month, today's post is the reveal for the Secret Recipe Club.  And doesn't really have to do with Mother's Day.  Actually, it has to do with last week's holiday, Cinco De Mayo.

My assigned blog this month was Jane's Adventures in Dinner, written by the amazing Jane.  She's a chef, a teacher, a mother and an absolute wonder. Her blog is a real delight and her recipes all look absolutely delicious.

But, I kind of knew what inspiration I'd be looking for this month, regardless of what blog I was assigned - I knew I'd use this month's SRC as a way to find something new and fun to make for Cinco De Mayo.

And Jane didn't disappoint. She had several recipes to choose from, but I wound up choosing these, delightful looking Mexican style cookies that looked like they'd be the perfect Cinco De Mayo treat.

They came together super easily. 

Like other Mexican style cookies (called Mexican wedding cookies) that I've seen, these use powdered sugar as the sugar, rather than granulated. And these have a lovely helping of cinnamon, making them spicy and delicious.

I mixed the batter...

...and little man mixed up some cinnamon-(powdered) sugar, which we then used to coat balls of the dough.

 Little man got a big kick out of helping me make sure each of the dough balls was thoroughly coated. He used a fork to, as he put it, give each dough ball a hat of the powdered sugar/cinnamon mix. I know it's a blurry photo, but it was seriously adorable.

The prepared cookies were then placed on a cookie sheet...

...and baked to light-golden perfection.

And we all loved them! They're light and crisp, with a slightly spicy sweet taste from the cinnamon - the perfect end to our Cinco De Mayo meal!

And, by the way, I also tried one other recipe from Jane's blog. Well, sort of.  She has this delicious sounding Black Bean Soup recipe that just looked amazing. But I knew I'd be the only one in the house to eat it, no matter how good it was. So I used it as the inspiration for a black bean side dish that I served with our Navajo stack tacos.

Definitely repeating that - so delicious. And I also want to try the slow-cooked pork taco recipe she has at that same link with the black bean soup. As I said - there was no lack of inspiration this month!

Thanks, Jane, for the delicious recipes, the awesome inspiration, and for your super fun blog!

An InLinkz Link-up

Mexican Cinnamon Cookies
(from Jane's Adventures in Dinner)

1 cup butter
1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup confectioners’ sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease cookie sheets, or line them with parchment paper.
In a medium bowl, cream together the 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar and butter until smooth. Stir in the vanilla.
Combine the flour, salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon, then stir the dry ingredients into the creamed mixture to form a stiff dough.
In a separate bowl, mix together the 1 cup confectioners’ sugar and 1 teaspoon cinnamon.
Shape the dough into 1 inch balls and roll each ball in the powdered sugar/cinnamon mixture, then place on prepared cookie sheets.
Bake for 15 to 20 minutes in preheated oven, or until nicely browned. Cool cookies on wire racks.

Enjoy!