Homemade Peppernuts (the best little cookies in the world)
ByThere’s pepper in these cookies? Surely not! Yes, that’s why they’re called Peppernuts. Oh, but there are no nuts in the cookies. They’re called peppernuts because they have pepper in them, they are tiny and you eat them like you would eat a handful of nuts. Thus the name Peppernuts.
The best thing about Peppernuts? They taste just like my Grandma’s. I was so excited after I ate my first one twelve (it’s okay, they’re tiny, remember?). I hadn’t had a peppernut for YEARS, because the only person I ever knew to make them was Grandma and she’s been gone since before my oldest was born. Peppernuts…such sweet little bites of memories.
Peppernuts had actually fallen off my radar until my friend Gail mentioned them to me a couple of months ago. Suddenly…I NEEDED some peppernuts. Gail found a recipe and emailed it to me. Then of course I “whole wheat floured” and “sucanated” it…and woohoo…just like Grandma’s!
This experience gave me a whole new respect for Grandma because these tiny little cookies are a little bit time intensive. They’re not hard to make mind you…but the recipe makes a HUGE batch of dough, then you roll the dough into teeny tiny snakes and cut off teeny tiny pieces and you bake them into teeny tiny cookie bites. It took two to three hours to get through all of the dough. It was worth the time and effort, but I’m guessing I’ll only be making these a few times a year.
Peppernuts
1 cup butter, melted
4 cups sucanat
4 eggs
1 teaspoon real maple syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 Tablespoon hot water
6-7 cups whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1/2 teaspoon pepper
Beat first five ingredients well. Dissolve soda in water then add to first five ingredients. Mix well. Add dry ingredients to creamed mixture. Knead into firm dough (hand mixing will probably be required. This dough is too stiff for most electric mixers). Chill overnight or at least two hours. Roll into “snake-like rolls” a little smaller than dime size in diameter. Cut into small pieces about 1/4″ thick. Place on a cookie sheet and bake in 350° oven for 7-8 minutes. Store in an airtight container.
And now, some Peppernut Pictures…
As you can see from the amount of ingredients, this recipe does make a huge big blob of dough:
If in fact you cut your tiny little pieces not quite tiny enough, they expand and bake together into one huge crazy looking…thing…on your baking pan. You will then learn that your idea of tiny wasn’t tiny enough and you need to cut them even tinier. Take note, the following peppernuts are cut too big (even though they look small) and are too close together on the pan.
Which resulted in something freaky like this:
Instead cut them teeny-tiny like this:
So that they will look like this:
It is a little bit fun if they are too close together on the pan and you get a peppernut snowman:
Or a peppernut worm:
After you have rolled and cut your twenty sixth snake, you will realize that it’s easier to line up a snake or two and cut them at the same time. This revelation saves you 18 precious seconds.
These Peppernuts fill up the biggest bowl you have and then some. They’re great to package up in small bags to give as Christmas time gifts to coworkers and neighbors.
But of course, you should put some in cute jars and keep them in your kitchen for family time munching with Hot Cocoa.
You know what’s better than eating Peppernuts?
Looking at Peppernuts in cute jars.
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Those are so cute. I’ve never heard of peppernuts! Pepper in cookies makes me curious. I’ll have to give them a try. And they do look adorable in your jars.
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Mary Lou Yoder Reply:
June 29th, 2011 at 9:03 pm
In my little Peppernut Cookbook from KS, it says that many many years ago, pepper was a general term for ‘spices’. It it is not referring to ‘black pepper’. Thank you for this recipe. It lookes like one I’ll by trying!
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I can’t believe you posted this recipe!! This is the recipe I’ve been dreaming of for years! I grew up (in my early years) in a little Mennonite town in Kansas, where the ladies made these every year at Christmas. My mom made them too, so I have happy memories of them. But I always wanted to find a recipe that had healthful ingredients in it. This is wonderful, and I can’t wait to try them! Thank you!
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Amber Reply:
December 15th, 2010 at 8:20 am
It wasn’t Buhler was it?? This is where my husbands grandparents lived and I have all his grandmothers ‘pfeffernusse’ recipies. They were german mennonite!!
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Keren Beeck Reply:
February 9th, 2012 at 1:40 pm
My grandparents lived in Buhler, too. I’m probably related to your
husband. My great-great grandfather, Heinrich B. Friesen, emigrated
from Alexanderthal, Russia to central Kansas in the 1800′s.
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Those are pepernoten! A little brown cookie of Dutch origins, traditionally served on St Nicolas Day, December 5th. We just had some that my sister-in-law smuggled in from Holland. My in-laws are Dutch and they would flip out for home-made pepernoten! Thanks!
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My grandma always made Pfeffernusse at Christmas – hers were bigger though, and rolled in powdered sugar after baking. And really, really peppery. I make them for my dad every year now and they are so nostalgic. :)
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Sharon Reply:
December 9th, 2010 at 4:26 pm
Same here. My grandmother was german and made them just like yours did.
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I’m going to have to try these. Can you use brown sugar instead of sucanat, because I’m not sure where to buy it around here?
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Christine Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 1:40 am
I was wondering also if I would use brown sugar or regular sugar.
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Laura Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 7:44 am
Yes, brown sugar will work just fine!
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I’ve seen cloves once and they looked like little sticks. Is that what your talking about? Is there minced or a powder type cloves(like nutmeg, ginger, allspice, etc.).
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Laura Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 7:44 am
No, I used ground cloves, found in the spice section.
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These are my kiddos favorite thing, my friend gave me a recipe for peppernuts ten years ago and they have become a family favorite. When my kids want them they ask me to make the dogfood cookies!
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How interesting! I’ve been curious about peppernuts since seeing the recipe in Joy of Cooking, and I think your pictures have given me the motivation to try them! I am wondering what the purpose of 1 tsp. maple syrup is… Was that in the original recipe?
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Laura Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 7:45 am
The original recipe just called for “syrup”, which I assumed to mean “corn syrup”. So, I just used maple syrup, but I would imagine you could leave it out of this recipe and be just fine, since it calls for such a small amount!
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Ditto Raine’s question…can I use white sugar or brown sugar in place of the sucanat? I haven’t been able to buy sucanat just yet.
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Laura Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 7:46 am
Yep, you can use brown sugar!
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LOOOOOOOVE me some peppernuts!!!
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Awwww, this post makes me smile, and I can actually SMELL them. ;) It’s been years, but yes… grandma made them all the time. I think my mom even made them.
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I grew up on these. I don’t think mine have pepper in them, but they do have anise. When I was young my mom used to make them to sell at bake sales so she came up with a time saving tip. She rolls out the dough and then uses a funnel to cut out the peppernuts. You can get about 50 in the funnel and then tip it out onto the cookie sheet. It was the our job to arrange them on the pan. A metal funnel works best for this.
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Perhaps they should be called PepperNOTS!
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So I’m wondering, could you just pipe little buttons of the dough onto the baking sheet? That would possibly leave the top with a little curlie-cue like a chocolate chip but that could be cute. Let me know what you think, if the dough is soft enough to pipe. I don’t have enough time to cut snakes but I could pipe them easily…
:) Allie
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Laura Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 10:17 am
The dough is awfully stiff. I think it would be tough to pipe them, but you could try it!
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Not trying to be a pest but your directions say “Beat first six ingredients well. Dissolve soda in water then add to first six ingredients.” Now if I am counting correctly, the baking soda is one of the first 6 ingredients….am I goofing this up somehow or was one of the first 6 ingredients accidentally missed?
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Laura Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 10:20 am
Oops…I edited that to say “FIVE”!! Sorry about that and thanks for pointing that out. Originally, the sucanat was broken down into a measurement of brown sugar and a measurement of white sugar, making it six. THANK YOU for pointing this out!
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This sounds like something I’d like to try to make! I’ll put in real sugar, though. ;)
So cute in those jars!
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WOW! I think I will try this out! Thank you so much for posting it!
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I read this post this morning and decided cookies were in order. I did make a few small changes. I didn’t have any allspice so I omitted that. I also added a bit more maple syrup than the recipe called for. I happened to have a 1.7 ounce, sample bottle of Cracker Barrel 100% pure maple syrup. I just went ahead and dumped it all in. ;)
I only needed about 6 cups of flour plus a little more for rolling it into ropes so it wouldn’t stick to the cutting board. I didn’t chill it at all. They turned out GREAT! They are crispy and sweet with just the perfect spice flavor to them. I already have a few cute little jars that I plan to fill for a few neighbors. Thanks for the recipe! It’s a keeper!
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Rene C Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 2:49 pm
Oh, and I used all white sugar.
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Can’t wait to try these! Thanks for the recipe!
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Wow, I was not expecting to see a post about peppernuts! Did your grandma have German or Mennonite roots? We had these every Christmas growing up. I rolled plenty of “snakes” and chopped them up! :) They are sooo good dunked in a hot drink! Totally made my day to see this post and they look beautiful in your jars, Laura!!
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Martha Reply:
December 9th, 2010 at 2:26 pm
That’s funny, because my twins were dunking them in their hot cocoa today! :o)
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Those are so cute! Are they crispy? I’ve been thinking about cookie crisp cereals and how you could make a healthier substitute. I bet these would be good in milk :-)
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Laura Reply:
December 8th, 2010 at 10:09 pm
Yeah, they’re crispy!! I like your idea of making them into a cereal…I think that’d be yummy!
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Peppernuts are delicious! My husband’s family had Mennonite roots and these were a tradition. They are labor intensive, but one thing to make them a little easier is when you have the dough made, roll it out flat like pie dough. Then with a sharp knife cut them into little squares (all your cuts one way and then all your cuts the other way about 1/2 inch apart) and then transfer a bunch of them to your cookie sheet at one time (on a spatula)and then spread them out.
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We’ve just finished making these and they are a hit all around!
After refrigerating them all night, the dough was so hard I didn’t think we’d be able to roll it out, but after working a ball of dough, it rolled great, and we didn’t even need to flour the surface.
After the first couple cookie sheets full, I lowered the heat to 325 and baked for 7 minutes.
Hint: These don’t have to be labor intensive. Just sit the children at the table with cutting boards and let them go at it! My kids loved it!
Laura, do you know it they freeze well?
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Laura Reply:
December 9th, 2010 at 3:19 pm
I’ve never frozen them, but I don’t know why it would be a problem. I freeze regular cookies all the time, I think these would work similarly.
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My Grandma was came from a German Mennonite family and made these for Christmas every year. She made the traditional Pfeffernuesz (a lot like this recipe) along with a citron version and a raisin version. I don’t think anybody in our family has attempted these since she passed away almost 10 years ago because they are so very time-intensive. And I think we’re all a bit worried that they won’t end up like Grandma’s!
I’m definitely inspired now, however! They taste just like Christmas. :)
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What a great recipe. I just finished cutting the last of the dough. I left out the ginger as I didn’t have any, but so tasty still. I made some big and the smaller ones are crispier. Love both though. I am going to give these away to my kids preschool teachers and my oldest kids instructors at their activities. Thank you for this recipe, it will be a family tradition now.
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You just crack me up!
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Not trying to be petty here, but sucanet is real whole sugar – what you are referring to is refined and processed sugar (regardless of whether it’s white or brown) which has had all of it’s nutritive value removed and a higher sucrose (messes with glycemic index) content.
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Laura Reply:
December 10th, 2010 at 9:29 pm
Hmm…I’ve read through the post again and I can’t quite figure out what you’re referring to or “being petty about”?? What am I missing about the sucanat? Sorry, it must be past my bedtime!
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Martha Reply:
December 12th, 2010 at 3:10 pm
Closer to the top of the thread, Jessica said she would use “real” sugar. I think that’s what the poster is refering to.
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We made these tonight! So much fun, rolling and cutting and baking…. 8 pans total! We estimated to have 600 cookies… well, probably only 500 now! They are great!
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Wow! With such glowing recommendations I had to try these. I made the dough last night & baked them this morning. My Hubby doesn’t like cloves or ginger, but I thought I’d try them on the boys. They loved them!! And Hubby tried them & asked “why did you think I wouldn’t like these?” Thanks for the recipe & the motivation to try it!! Absolutely a keeper.
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Pam is going to try and get these made this week. (She saw the recipe on your blog!) So I am hoping there will still be some to bring over here at Christmas. :) Actually, I am thinking about making them–I know, I know you can’t believe it–but they are just so stinking good and I love the idea of giving them as gifts in jars!
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Laura Reply:
December 12th, 2010 at 3:13 pm
Go Gail…Go Gail… :)
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I just made these and they are amazing!!! These are for sure my new favorite Christmas cookie although I would bet I will make them through out the year!!
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My only question is the flour. It says 6-7 cups…. A cup is a lot of difference! If I start with only 6 cups, how do I tell if I should add more? And one more ?.. I know I said only one, but should I mix it with a fork or what, because if its too stiff for something electric, then its too stiff for a whisk…
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Laura Reply:
December 14th, 2010 at 3:07 pm
Start with six and trust me, you’ll know if the dough can handle more or not! It’ll get stiff and turn into a nice blob of dough…or it will show signs of stickiness, letting you know that you need to add a little more. If you do need more, I say just add a little bit at a time until the dough forms a blob. I used a wooden spoon to mix this and it worked great!
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Andrew Goossen Reply:
December 16th, 2010 at 11:41 am
I mix my recipe with a heavy Duty Kitchen Aid Mixer and a dough hook. When the mixer starts to bog
down, I turn the dough onto a floured counter and in 1/3 cup amounts, knead in about 2 to 2 1/2 cups
more flour. The dough will be MUCH thicker and stiffer than bread dough. It will be a lot more like stiff
cookie dough. Modeler clay will be just a little stiffer than your peppernut dough.
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Do you think oat flour could be used? I am trying to incorporate oats into my family’s daily diet and it has been hard because only one of the five us likes the traditional oatmeal. We have a family history of high cholestorol it is important to me to get in more oats.
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Laura Reply:
December 15th, 2010 at 10:36 am
I would imagine that it would work, but I don’t have any experience with oat flour, so I can’t say for sure.
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Ann Reply:
December 15th, 2010 at 9:28 pm
I wouldn’t use oat flour alone. It’s a pretty soft grain, and the texture might be off. You might try mixing one or two cups of it in with the wheat flour, though…
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Oh, my goodness! I read the recipe, explained to the children if they wanted these little nuggets, then it was up to them to make the cookies. They did and we are most pleased with them. I’ve never eaten this kind of cookie before, so I have nothing with which to compare them. No matter, THESE are excellent! The children are speaking of “next batches”. Thank you so very much for sharing this recipe. Now we have another yummy choice for our Christmas cookies.
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I just made a batch. My recipe is a little different, but I grew up with them. Most of my siblings do not make them anymore because of the work cutting them. It is time consuming. I loved them enough that I invented a multiple cutter. I roll the dough out on a floured counter, 1/4″ thick. Then I use the cutter, which cuts and properly spaces 6 at a time. Once cut, they are delivered to the cookie sheet where a push of a lever delivers all 6, evenly spaced to the cookie sheet. I can get 400 on a cookie sheet in 7 minutes. My recipe uses light brown sugar, flour, molasses, Light syrup and spices. One batch makes 3,250 peppernuts. I made a batch 3 days ago and it is almost gone. These little peppernuts are almost habit forming. Love ‘em.
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I’d never heard if these but was looking for something different for gift baskets for Christmas this year. I just made a batch of these and they will be a perfect addition to the baskets! Warning though – these are highly addictive!!!
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I grew up in a Mennoite family in a Mennonite community and my family has 2 different peppernut recipes. This is close to what we refer to as “soft” peppernuts except our recipe uses anise oil. The other recipe is what we refer to as “hard” peppernuts and uses molasses (results in a darker cookie) and anise seeds. These are not as crispy and are more dense when cooked. I’ll have to try & convert them over to a healthier recipe. I am going without any this year (probably the 1st year ever for me not to have any).
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I’m so surprised that your recipe does not include Anise flavoring. The recipe from my German grandma includes it, and I’d say it’s the strongest flavor. I don’t think Pfefferneuse would taste like Pfefferneuse to me without it!
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I’m curious about rolling into snakes. Is there a particular reason you have to do this step? I was thinking of rolling out the dough to 1/4″ and cut strips then smaller pieces with a pizza cutter. Or even a pastry cutter – that might give them a nice, pretty edge?
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Laura Reply:
January 16th, 2011 at 1:58 pm
I think that would work just fine. The point is to make them into tiny cookies, so that’s a great idea!
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my hips are growing wider just READING your recipes ! I cant wait to try these.. though i think I’l cut the recipe in half just for starters :D
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Laura, I have to tell you—-I read and re-read every post you have about your jar obsession. I, too, love my jars and anything I put in them. I love having them, looking at them, and I get such a kick when I find a new, oddly shaped one. What is wrong with us?? God’s blessing to you and your family at this Christmas season and in the new year to come. Love everything about your site~
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I have been reading through the posts and are lot say its too time consuming and that you remember your grandmothers making them. PLEASE think ahead to when you will have grandchildren to make these with and the “time consuming” will be time spent with loved ones.
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Sweet to see these as they are definitely a German treat. i lived in Germany and these are on every Christmas cookie plate! Pfeffernusse! Fun to see how things like this are still being used years after our ancestors came here.
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mmm, I know what I’m making for our day-after-Christmas family get together! How many days in advance do you think I could make these that they would still be “fresh”? I did see the above comment about freezing them, and might do that tho I hesitate since Ive never even had peppernuts before, i wouldnt want to experiment on my extended family like that. They already think I’m strange! Wouldnt want to bring an experiment-gone-wrong to feed them ;)
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AllieZirkle Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 2:53 pm
Dara, we made these last year and LOVED them! You can make these at any point this month and store in a sealed container or ziptop bags with great results. These cookies have a crunch to them and since they are on the small side (think size of a penny or nickel and puffed up), they retain their texture quite well. The flavor stays too. We kept some in the fridge and some on the counter. I can’t remember having an issue with either. Good luck and enjoy!
~Allie
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Dara Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 6:45 pm
thanks Allie! I’m very excited to make these… and glad to know I can do them ahead of time! :)
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LindseyforLaura@HHM Reply:
December 19th, 2011 at 1:29 pm
These should last for around 2 days. :)
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LindseyforLaura@HHM Reply:
December 19th, 2011 at 1:30 pm
Sorry! I meant to write 2 weeks!!!
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I couldn’t get the dough to come together on these even after adding two extra eggs. I used evaporated cane juice sugar so maybe that made a difference? I was able to scoop them out into regular sized cookies and they are delicious. I guess my mess up saved me a lot of time not being able to make little cookies!
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A friend posted this… might make preparation simpler?
http://davispeppernutmaker.webs.com/
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These were delicious. I just made a half recipe, but used the butter for a full recipe. It worked out quite well.
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My German Mennonite great-great grandparents immigrated from Russia to central Kansas in the 1800′s. My grandparents ended up living in Buhler. Grandma Friesen used to bake these cookies, and my mom got the recipe from her. My parents were missionaries in Japan, but while I was in college in the States my mom would bake these cookies at Christmastime and send them to me in a reused cookie tin. They were so hard, they kept for months!
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