Chocolate Chip Walnut Crescent Cookie Recipe

Pretty much everyone enjoys a cookie, especially a homemade one. Everyone loves classics like chocolate chip, but one particular type of cookie you may not be familiar with is a crescent cookie. It's soft, dusted with powdered sugar, and the dough is made with ground nuts — in this case, walnuts, which in addition to being tasty, have more antioxidants and omega-3s than the average nut and may even help lower blood pressure.

"The addition of mini chocolate chips is unique to this recipe — they add a little crunch and, of course, chocolate flavor to the buttery cookie," says Kate Shungu, who developed this simple yet satisfying cookie recipe that requires only six common ingredients you likely already have on hand. "These cookies are traditional around the holidays, but truthfully they are delicious year-round. I love them with a glass of milk," she adds. Here's how to whip up these eye-catching walnut crescent cookies.

This cookie recipe only requires a few ingredients: Walnuts, salted butter, vanilla extract, flour, powdered sugar, and mini chocolate chips. "Walnuts should be unsalted," Shungu explains. "Since we are toasting the walnuts in this recipe, they do not need to be roasted. Either halves or chopped walnuts will work for this recipe."

Walnuts are integral to this cookie recipe, so it's no surprise the first step involves toasting your walnuts on the stove in a dry skillet. Once they cool down, put them in a food processor and give them a whirl until you're left with a nice, nutty powder.

Now, it's dough time. Take the walnuts out of your food processor container and put in the vanilla, flour, butter, and powdered sugar. Use the pulse setting until it looks doughy, then stir in the chocolate chips. Like to plan ahead? You're in luck: "You can make the dough several days in advance. Cover it and refrigerate it until you're ready to roll the cookies," Shungu says.

Once you've got your dough, prep a sheet pan with parchment paper or a silicone mat. Scoop out a small chunk at a time and roll it into a tube shape, then curve it into a crescent, squeezing the ends a bit to create more dimension in the shape. Once you've formed all your crescents, put the dough in the fridge for an hour or so.

After you've chilled your dough, take it out, preheat your oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit, and bake your crescent cookies until they're lightly golden. Take them out of the oven, let them cool briefly, then move them to a wire rack until they reach room temperature. Put the rest of the powdered sugar in a bowl, roll each cookie in it, and place each piece on wax paper. Now you're free to dig into these nutty, sweet, chocolate-studded treats. "Leftovers will last for about a week in an airtight container at room temperature," Shungu says.