How to Make Homemade Danish Wedding Cookies

UPDATED 11/2023 :: Today I’m sharing a wonderfully nostalgic and highly delicious recipe for Homemade Danish Wedding Cookies. How do I love these things? Let me count the ways (in my head, I’ll spare you). Read on for a little more about these cookie babies, or simply jump right ahead to the recipe.

Homemade Danish Wedding Cookies

On the occasional better-than-usual grocery shopping excursion with my Dad, he’d let me select a single special something and toss it into the cart. As you might suspect, my special something was almost always a treat of the confectionary persuasion, and the cookie aisle was where I’d do my perusing.

Sometimes I’d opt for Oreos, and sometimes those frosted animal cookies with colorful sprinkles. But more often than not, I’d go for the pink, crinkly bag of Keebler Danish Wedding Cookies. They were my favorite (after Keebler discontinued the Magic Middles) and I think Dad was always happy when that pink bag made it’s way into the cart.

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What are Danish Wedding Cookies?

Simple, straightforward and nostalgic as can be, a “Danish Wedding Cookie” is a buttery, slightly cinnamon-spiced, bite-sized cookie that has finely chopped nuts (walnuts or pecans, typically) and usually some vanilla. Danish Wedding Cookies, while built on similar foundations, are richer, crunchier, and a bit more flavorful than a basic sugar cookie.

The cookies are rolled in powdered sugar while they’re still just a little warm, to give them an extra sweet touch and a charming snowball-like appearance (I think this is what makes them such a popular holiday cookie table choice). The nuts are thought to represent the bumps in the road of life, but coated by the sweetness of marriage – the powdered sugar.

To be honest, that last explanation raises so many snarky questions from me that I can barely let this post come and go without raising them. But this is meant to be a snark-free zone, for the most part. So, I’ll just leave that one alone. Yay for sugar-coating life’s hardships by slapping on some marriage!

Contrary to Popular Belief …

… the Danish wedding cookie isn’t actually of Danish descent – it’s not Danish at all. Sometimes you’ll see them (or incredibly similar iterations of them) called Mexican Wedding Cookies. These little shortbread-esque cookie balls are not actually an import of Denmark, interestingly enough. Even though they’re named or labeled as part of Scandinavian cookery or in vintage cook books.

There is a fairly similar recipe for Jødekager (Danish cinnamon cookies) and one for Vaniljekranse (vanilla-flavored cookie rings), but nothing that is exactly this. I personally think this is funny and it makes me more intrigued by these little cookies with every passing word I type, and the further down the cookie research rabbit hole I fall.

While most Danes are not sure how this particular cookie was named the “Danish Wedding Cookie,” no one seems to have a problem with the association. The snowy-white exteriors and the lightly spiced, slightly crunchy interiors have made these Danish Wedding Cookies a long-time favorite for so many – they are a popular choice for holiday platters the world over.

What is the difference between Italian, Danish and Mexican Wedding Cookies?

It’s funny, you’d think there would be a bit more information on this highly intriguing topic floating around on the internet than there is. But I am here to tell you that the topic of wedding cookies, however fascinating it may be, is somewhat lacking in its representation, me thinks.

A wedding cookie by any other name …

I recently enjoyed a couple of Italian Wedding Cookies at a bakery that frankly looked and tasted no different than the wonderful Danish Wedding Cookies that I’ve been eating my whole life. Those cookies are also commonly referred to as Mexican Wedding Cookies. Hmmm. Curiouser and curiouser. So, it would seem that the notion of wedding cookies is 1) well-traveled and 2) rather fluid.

In Italy, it seems rather common for a tower of cookies to take the place of a huge cake. Instead, guests enjoy small cookies and tea cakes as sweet celebrations of the nuptials. Fun! Recipes for Italian wedding cookies tend to vary a bit more from one to the next. Some will contain sprinkles or a frosting of some sort, and some just a coating of confectioner’s sugar. But Danish/Mexican Wedding Cookie recipes are relatively consistent in their architecture. This, incidentally, is what we’re whipping up here today.

What’s peculiar to me, is that there really is no recipe like this present in the history of Danish pastries and confections of which to speak – there’s no little bite-sized, nut-filled, sugar-snow covered balls to be found in the annals of Danish baking. All of this to say – these cookies are no more Danish than I am (I am zero percent Danish).

How to Make Danish Wedding Cookies

This Danish Wedding Cookie recipe really is incredibly simple. We’re only reaching for a few basic baking pantry staples for this one.

To create the bite-sized lightly cinnamon scented cookies, all you need is to build a simple dough from all-purpose flour, powdered sugar, some vanilla extract. You could add a tiny splash of almond extract if you wish. Also, very finely chopped toasted walnuts go on the mix, along with a few mini chocolate chips. Oh, and butter, Of course.

Keys to Making the Best Danish Wedding Cookies:

Firstly, the walnuts. We’re going to toast ours in this recipe, which really is like adding another ingredient to the cookie dough – but not (a hallmark My Kitchen Little trick). Toasted nuts are just so much richer and more delicious than un-toasted. Plus, the toasting is so quick and simple that it’s just worth doing. Simply toast them in a small, dry skillet set over medium heat, stirring a few times, until you smell them. Cool them and then chop them very finely.

It’s important to take an extra second or two to really run your knife over the walnut pieces to ensure they’re nice and tiny. These cookies are so small that having large pieces of nuts running throughout tends to mess with the consistency of their insides. So, I like to keep things nice and petite.

Secondly, tossing them in sugar when they’re still warm. I like to let the cookies cool a little bit on the baking sheet, until they’re easily handled. Then, while they’re still warm, I toss them in loads of powdered sugar until fully coated. It might sound counter-intuitive to do so, but tossing your little Danish Wedding Cookies in the sugar while still a little warm will help the sugar to really stick to the cookies.

Finally, the chocolate. Most recipes for Danish Wedding Cookies don’t actually feature chocolate. But the pink bagged Keebler ones do/did, and therefore so will mine. To me, the chocolate is delicious with the cinnamon and walnuts. The key – just like with the nuts – is to buy the mini chips and to even chop them up a little more. I just do this along with the nuts, all at once.

Post Resources: One Stop Party Ideas, Cook Zucchini, Keebler, Baker’s Table, and Recipe Lion (on You Tube)

If you like the looks of these Homemade Danish Wedding Cookies, you might also enjoy:

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Peanut Butter Stuffed Chocolate Sugar Cookies

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