Cheddar Cheese Rounds

• servings: about 5 dozen

Ingredients

1/4 cup pecans

1 1/4 cups (6¼ ounces/177 grams) all- purpose flour

1 tablespoon cornstarch

2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese

8 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 stick), cut into pieces and softened

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1/2 teaspoon salt

Directions

1. Process pecans, flour, and cornstarch in food processor until finely ground. Add remaining ingredients and pulse until dough forms. Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface and roll into two 8-inch logs. Wrap tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm, at least 1 hour or up to 3 days.

2. Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 400 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Slice logs into 1/4-inch rounds and place 3/4 inch apart on prepared baking sheets. Bake until golden, about 15 minutes, switching and rotating baking sheets halfway through baking. Let cool 3 minutes on sheets, then transfer to wire rack and cool completely. Serve. (Rounds can be kept in airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.)

Make Ahead: At the end of step 1, logs can be wrapped in plastic, then foil, and frozen for up to 1 month. Defrost in refrigerator before proceeding with step 2.

Notes

Why This Recipe Works

The best versions of cheddar cheese rounds are flaky-crisp and pleasantly sandy-like tiny rounds of savory shortbread. The worst cheddar cheese rounds can be tough and floury and have little cheddar flavor. To avoid a floury taste, we cut back on the amount of flour in our Cheddar Cheese Rounds recipe, and replaced some of it with ground pecans. The moisture from the pecans made the cheddar cheese rounds slightly softer, so we added cornstarch to the dough, which gave the rounds a crisp, pleasantly shortbread texture to go along with their nutty, cheddary flavor.

Cooks country 2008 December/ January in 2007 annual