Chinese Almond Cookies are simple, crisp, buttery, and full of almond flavor. This recipe is a perfect treat to make for Lunar New Year!
These Chinese Almond Cookies are one of the easiest cookie recipes I’ve tried. All you need is simply combine all the ingredients in a bowl, roll into small balls, and bake in the oven for 15 minutes. The cookies are crisp, buttery, and full of almond flavor!
Chinese Almond Cookies for the Lunar New Year!
In Japan, we celebrate the New Year on January 1st (read more). As I married a Taiwanese American husband, I started to celebrate Lunar New Year as well. Since the holiday is a regular day here in the U.S., we typically go out to eat at Chinese restaurants to celebrate with his family and friends instead of cooking up a storm like most families do in Asia.
One exception is I make these almond cookies. I learned from my Chinese blogger friends in Asia that these traditional Chinese almond cookies are enjoyed during the Lunar New Year. Almond cookies symbolize coins so people make or buy these cookies to bring good fortune.
Almond cookies have a crisp bite and sandy crumbly texture. When you bite, almond meal/flour and almonds on top give really nice almond flavor in your mouth. And these cookies are delightful with a cup of tea or coffee.
Almond Meal vs. Almond Flour
You can use either almond meal or almond flour in today’s recipe. But what is the difference?
Almond meal and almond flour both consist of ground almonds, but here is the difference.
- Almond meal is coarsely ground and made from almonds with their skins.
- Almond flour is finely ground and made from blanched almonds without skins. Other names for almond flour are powdered almonds and almond powder.
The obvious difference is in how they look. Almond meal is speckled with bits of almond skin while the blanched almond flour is creamy tan.
The almond meal that I use for today’s recipe is from Trader Joe’s (you see the bits of dark almond skin), but Bob’s Red Mill has both types (Natural Almond Meal vs Almond Meal/Flour).
If you’re wondering if you can skip the all-purpose flour and use 100% almond meal or almond flour for these Chinese almond cookies, I would not recommend so. You have to include the all-purpose flour to make these almond cookies. You could add a few drops of the almond extract for even more intense almond taste.
Serve these cookies for the upcoming Chinese New Year and if you celebrate this holiday. I hope you have a wonderful celebration with your family and friends.
新年快乐 (Xin Nian Kuai Le)!
Happy New Year!
恭喜發財 (Gong Xi Fa Cai)!
Wishing you a prosperous new year!
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Almond Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup almond meal/flour (if you use almond meal (ground almonds with skin), you may need to add more oil, so adjust the amount as you mix the dough)
- 1½ cups all-purpose flour (plain flour) (weigh your flour; for weights, click the Metric button; or use the “fluff and sprinkle“ method and level it off)
- 120 g sugar (½ cup + 2 Tbsp)
- ¼ tsp Diamond Crystal kosher salt
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- ½ cup neutral oil (or more, as needed, to form the dough into balls)
- roasted unsalted almonds (optional; for decoration)
- 1 large egg yolk
Instructions
- Before You Start: I highly encourage you to weigh your ingredients using a kitchen scale for this recipe. For weights, click the Metric button above. If you‘re using a cup measure, please follow the “fluff and sprinkle“ method: Fluff your flour with a spoon, sprinkle it into your measuring cup, and level it off. Otherwise, you may scoop more than you need.
- Gather all the ingredients. Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350ºF (180ºC). For a convection oven, reduce the cooking temperature by 25ºF (15ºC).
To Make the Dough
- Combine all the dry ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer: 1 cup almond meal/flour, 1½ cups all-purpose flour (plain flour), 120 g sugar (½ cup + 2 Tbsp), ¼ tsp Diamond Crystal kosher salt, 1 tsp baking powder, and 1 tsp baking soda. Fit your mixer with a beater attachment and mix on low-medium speed.
- Slowly add ½ cup neutral oil and mix until a cohesive dough forms.
- The dough should be just moist enough to hold its shape when you roll it into a ball. If it looks too crumbly, add 2–3 tsp (10–15 ml) neutral oil at a time until it‘s the right consistency.
To Shape the Cookies
- Weigh and divide the dough into 0.4 oz, 10 g pieces for 1-inch (2.5-cm) cookies or 0.7 oz, 20 g pieces for 1½-inch (3.8-cm) cookies. After weighing the pieces, roll each into a ball with your palms. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and repeat until you‘ve rolled all the dough. Tip: You can make a 10-gram ball using a teaspoon measuring spoon.
- If you want to put roasted unsalted almonds on the cookies (optional), hold a cookie ball in your palm and gently press one almond into the dough.
- Beat 1 large egg yolk in a small bowl. Using a pastry brush, lightly brush the top of the cookie balls with the egg yolk.
To Bake
- Bake at 350ºF (180ºC) for 15–20 minutes, or until the cookies become slightly golden. Let them cool on a wire rack before serving. Enjoy!
To Store
- You can keep the leftovers in an airtight container and store on the countertop for 4–5 days or in the freezer for a month.
Notes
- Fluff up the flour several times with a spoon.
- Using the spoon, sprinkle the flour into your dry-cup measure.
- Scrape off the excess with a knife.
Nutrition
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on February 10, 2013. The content has been updated with more information in January 2017.
Hi Nami,
I added one tea spoon of almost extract and it taste is reminiscent of cookie I had as child in Taiwan.
Thanks!
Hi Amy! Awww wonderful! I’m so happy to hear that. I’ll try adding almond extract too! Thanks for your tip! 🙂
Hi,
Today It my first time to bake Almond cookie, I don’t Know what different is Almond powder and Almond flour?
But I used Almond powder, lucky it come out from oven it look amazing those cookie and taste just like cookie 🤣.i was so worried 😟 everything can go wrong.i was spent almost half day to bake cookie 🍪🤣🤣.thanks for cookie ingredients 🙏🏻
Hi Gigi! Thank you so much for trying this recipe! I’m glad you enjoyed it! The almond flour and almond flour are same things. 🙂
These cookies are delicious and easy to make! One of my family members is avoiding dairy products, so this recipe is perfect since it uses vegetable oil instead of butter. Thank you so much for your recipe.
Hi Miko! I’m so happy to hear you liked the cookies! Thank you for trying this recipe and for your kind feedback. 🙂
My dough was very loose when I tried this. what should i change? More oil did not help much
Hi J! Thank you for trying this recipe! Did you make any changes to the recipe? I am not sure why yours is too loose. Did you press and try to roll? Maybe your oil is not enough (even though you think you added more oil)?
Hi! I love this recipe! I am wondering if I could omit the egg yolk wash at the end? I’m plant based 🙂 Thanks
Hi Queennie! Sure that’s okay. It’s brushed for the look. 🙂
Hi Nami,
For this recipe, I am a little bit confused about the almond flour/meal.
Do I buy almond flour or almond meal? In your notes, you mentioned, I cannot just use almond flour or almond meal
Or do I need to buy almond flour/meal, which is a mix?
Is there any other flour I can use?
Thank you
Crystal
You can get either one. I explained the difference in the post, but it’s really up to you. I’ve made with both, and they are pretty much the same, except almond meal a bit darker in color due to the skin included. I mentioned that you can use 100% almond meal or almond flour skipping wheat flour that’s part of the recipe.
Hope that’s clear.
Great thank you so much for the clarification!
I plan to make these cookies for CNY this year!
I hope you enjoy!
Also, is it possible to substitude the all purpose flour with more almond flour to make this a GF cookie?
Hi Crystal! I mentioned in the post, but I am not sure about substituting with all almond flour. Maybe it may work but I haven’t tried it so I can’t suggest (yet). If you try, let us know!
How many days you can keep the cookie ?
Hi Alice! If you keep well, probably 5-7 days. We don’t keep them more than 3 days tho. 🙂
I think there is a typo in the amounts for the ingredients listed. The first two lines read:
120 grams almond meal/flour (1 cup)
180 grams all-purpose flour (½ cup)
If 120 grams equals 1 cup, then 180 grams equals 1 1/2 cups (not a half cup).
You may want to change that or else there will not be enough flour and the dough will be wet and sticky.
I used 1 1/2 cups of regular flour and the dough came out just fine. I also used lard instead of oil.
Thank you for the recipe. I wanted to make these for the Chinese New Year.
Hi Diana! Thank you for catching this. Yesterday I fixed inside my parenthesis in the recipe.
Until yesterday, it used to be written as
120 grams almond meal/flour (120 g = 1 cup)
180 grams all-purpose flour (180 g = 1 ½ cup) (See Notes) etc etc
But it’s silly to write duplicate gram measurement in ( ), so whenever I respond comments on my old recipes like this one, I’ve been fixing by removing those extra “=” part in the parenthesis. I guess I deleted “180 g = 1” by mistake! I put back 1…. That could cause a major error… So thank you!
No, previous recent commenters are talking about my correct recipe (before I delete 1 by mistake). As I stated in my Notes section, I follow someone’s recipe (linking back to the original recipe), but only change I made is adding 30 ml (2 Tbsp) more oil than hers. I think the reason I had to use more oil is that my almond flour includes the almonds with skin (brown bits), while her almond meal is white and no skin. I think the skin absorbs more oil. 150 ml was needed for me to make into balls; otherwise, it was not combined together. Therefore, I had to suggest “more or less” in notes.
Hope this is clear. In case anyone reading this comment is wondering what we’re discussing about. 🙂
My cookies came out great! Very good directions. The only change I made was I used chilled lard instead of oil. I cut it into the dry ingredients with a pastry blender. It made the cookies melt in your mouth!
Hi Diana! I’m so glad to hear that! Ohh lard! I think traditionally these Chinese almond cookies are made with lard too. Sounds delicious!
Hello, I’m considering using lard for these cookies and was wondering how much of the chilled (solid form? or melted and then chilled to room temp?) you used instead of the oil. Thanks.
Recipe yielded very tasty almond cookies. However, the dough was too wet/sticky when I tried to mould it and the cookies end up crumbly. Any suggestions what I can do to improve the next batch?
Hi Christina! The cookies are supposed to be sticky when making into balls and crumbly after being baked. At Step 4, did you have to add more oil or your mixture was okay?
The dough was of correct texture as you described. It just got too crumbly to handle when baked – it just broke apart once someone picks it up.
Hi Christina! That doesn’t sound right. I’m so sorry to hear that. 🙁
Hello! I remade them today and I realised that the last one failed because I added too much oil! I controlled it this time and it turned out beautifully! I could weigh them properly and made about 49 cookies. Thank you so much for the recipe!
Hi Christina! I’m so happy this batch came out well. Yay!!! Thank you so much for your feedback. It means so much to me! 🙂
Hello! Thank you so much for the recipe! I was wondering if you can make the dough beforehand and then refrigerate it until you want to bake it since I want to make this for a party, but on the day of the party, I don’t have enough time to make everything. Thank you! 🙂
Hello Hesper! I am afraid you wanted to make for CNY and I didn’t get a chance to read your comment till now. 🙁 I am so sorry for my late response.
To answer your question, yes you can do it. Hope your party was successful, and I’m sorry again for my late response. Happy New Year!
Hello Nami! It’s alright! I’m planning to make the cookies again soon for some friends since my relatives really liked them! Thank you so much for the recipe and for answering my question! 🙂 Happy New Year!
Hi Hesper! I’m glad to hear. Thank you so much for trying this recipe. Happy New Year to you and your family! xo
Hello! My friend is vegan, but I would love to make this recipe for her. Do you have any recommendations for an egg substitute that would work as an egg wash? I’ve read some online but want to know your opinion!
I’ve been following your website for a few years now and have cooker many of your recipes for dessert and dinner! My colleagues love them, thank you 🙂
Hi Sonia! I am not an expert in terms of egg-less recipes. 🙁 I think it’s great without egg wash though. It just to give a nice shine to it. It does not affect on taste.
I’m happy to hear you enjoy my recipes and being on this journey with us! Thank you so much for your kind words!
I have been making these gorgeous cookies for many times. It’s been a hit every single time. My friends love it and ask for the recipe. The only thing is the amount of oil is varied each time. Sometimes I use less, so I will start with 120ml and judge the consistency from there.
Hi Chris! I’m so happy to hear you like the recipe. Good idea to add the oil slowly. My almond meal / flour included skin, and maybe that’s why I needed more too. 🙂
Thank you for sharing this recipe. I’ve made it a few times and it’s currently my favourite cookie. ????
I just want to know if you’ve ever made it with butter instead of oil.
My cookies always turn out very crumbly. Not sure if it’s because of the oil or over baking.
Thank you for trying this recipe and I’m so happy to hear you enjoy making these cookies. I’ve never tried it with butter, but it might be worthwhile to try (and let us know if you did). These cookies are supposed to be crumbly (but won’t break into pieces). 🙂
I was selling my almond cookies at a fair, when a Chinese lady approached and asked what kind of fat I was using….I reluctantly said lard, knowing that it was the real deal, but not popular, she smiled and took 3 dozen… (she also had a sample).
Since them I’ve asked a lot of people and lard seams to be genuine…Nami, what is your feeling about this, as I see you use butter? Judy rjpeters21@gmail.com
Hi Judy! I use vegetable oil in this recipe, and not butter. I’ve heard that my favorite Taiwanese pineapple cakes (from Taiwan) also use lard. It’s delicious! I have nothing against it. 🙂 In Asian cuisine, we use lard but I don’t see it in American butcher keeping it (maybe we have to ask). 🙂 Your almond cookies must be so delicious!!
Hey I’m new to this blog and love asian foods (except indian). My dad is especially picky (hates most) about asian foods so anything he likes I try to reproduce at home so we can both enjoy it.
About 2 months ago we went to a dim sum restaurant and tried their fried rice (which is the one asian food I usually don’t care for.) I it was dry, savory and slightly red with the reddish pork bits in it, and I can’t believe how much I liked it.
Fried rice is one of the few asian things my dad will eat, but I usually don’t care for it and I thought if I could make this planning dinner would be so much easier.
I was wondering if you knew what was in it and could either reproduce something similar or point me in the direction to find the recipe.
Thank you for all your hard work and I love your beautiful site.
Hi Erin! Welcome to my blog! Yes the pork pieces in the fried rice is called cha siu. My friend has a recipe here: http://thewoksoflife.com/2014/10/classic-pork-fried-rice/
Hope you and your dad can enjoy this dish right at your home! 🙂