Nutella Thumbprints

I'm starving!  Seriously.  I'm only a few hours from my wisdom tooth extraction and I'm not allowed to have anything to eat within six hours of the surgery.  Since my appointment is at 1:00, that means I either had to wake up at 5:00am and have breakfast, or I hold out until after I regain sanity tonight.  I opted to sleep in until 7:00, so I'm going to be no fun to be around today.

These cookies are sitting on the counter in my kitchen, taunting me with their delicious combination of crumbly cookie and crunchy nut coating.  Why didn't I eat more of these yesterday?

See you all on Thursday, when I will be four teeth shorter!
One Year Ago: Chicken Tacos & Corn Relish
Two Years Ago: Pizza Foccacia
Three Years Ago: Crunchy French Toast

Nutella Thumbprints

Adapted from Cooking Light (Maybe?)

I cut this recipe from a magazine and I have no idea which one it came from!  It's either Cooking Light or Shape.  Wherever this came from, these cookies are delicious.  You have to eat them pretty quickly because they don't store well (nutella sticks to everything!).  But don't worry, you will have no problem polishing off a batch in a few days.

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup powdered sugar
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter, softened
2 large egg yolks
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2/3 cup hazelnuts, chopped
1/3 cup Nutella

Preheat oven to 350 ºF.

In a bowl, whisk together flour, powdered sugar, coca powder and salt.  In another bowl, beat butter until light and fluffy.  Add egg yolks and vanilla extract and beat until combined.  Add all of the flour mixture to the butter mixture and beat on low until it just comes together (it will take a minute or two).  Turn dough out onto your counter and knead 5-6 times until smooth.

Shape dough into 28 1-inch balls.  Roll dough balls in chopped hazelnuts and place on a parchment paper lined baking sheet.  Press your thumb into the center of each dough ball. Bake cookies for 10 minutes.  Remove cookies from the baking sheet and let cool completely on a wire rack.  Once cookies are completely cool, spoon about 1/2 teaspoon nutella onto each cookie (I used a piping bag actually).  Enjoy!