These Norwegian Butter Cookies, or Serinakaker, are perhaps the Perfect Cookie. They’re super buttery, as the title suggests, and are similar to shortbread without being too crumbly. They are delicate and melt-in-your-mouth with subtle almond and vanilla flavors, and are so pretty sprinkled with sliced and chopped almond pieces.
If you are looking for a good Christmas cookie for this holiday season, I strongly suggest these!
When this article from food52 about Norwegian butter cookies popped up on my Facebook newsfeed last week, I knew I had to make them.
If you follow my blog, you know I’m part Greek- my other half is Norwegian. And yet, I haven’t posted any Norwegian recipes!
So here we go. This is an EXCELLENT place to start. (And no, I won’t be writing about Lutefisk anytime soon. Sorry to disappoint.)
These cookies are adapted from the food52 recipe to be a bit easier to make and have more almond flavor- a very common flavor in Scandinavian desserts.
Be warned: this recipe uses three sticks of butter. That’s 1.5 cups. They ARE butter cookies, after all! I recommend two things when choosing a butter:
- Use salted butter. Confession: I often use salted butter when baking (gasp!). I love the combination of sweet and salty, and since I use salted butter for other things, it simplifies my life to only buy one kind. This recipe REALLY benefits from the use of salted butter in creating a more complex flavor from very simple ingredients.
- Use high quality butter. I’m a big fan of Kerrygold products- once you try their salted butter spread on a hot piece of bread straight out of the oven, your life will be changed in ways you can’t even imagine. Not only is the taste of their butter out of this world, but it’s also healthier since it’s made from the milk of grass-fed cows. The color of it is brighter yellow than conventional butter, and it contains a better balance of healthy fats than other kinds because the cows’ diet is healthier. Guys, they aren’t even paying me to write about this. I just love their butter so much I had to tell you about it! And their CHEESE! Try the sweet cheddar when you get the chance.
The directions for this recipe aren’t like your typical cookie, where you mix the dry and liquid ingredients separately. Instead, the softened butter is blended with the flour to make a consistency similar to sand, kind of like cutting butter into flour for pie crust. I used a handheld electric mixer for this task and it was easy. Then, the other wet ingredients like eggs and extract are added to the dough.
Some recipes say to refrigerate the dough before forming, but I didn’t have a problem using it immediately. If you want to make the dough ahead of time, it can be refrigerated in an airtight container or covered with plastic wrap for a few days.
Finally, I recommend a small cookie scoop for measuring out the batter. It ensures the cookies are (mostly) uniform in size, and makes the task of rolling the dough into balls much easier.
If you like this recipe, you’ll love all these other holiday baking recipes, including this Dutch Butter Cake (also made with almonds and almond extract).
Recipe for Norwegian Butter Cookies (Serinakaker) below!
Norwegian Butter Cookies (Serinakaker)
Equipment
- small cookie scoop
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups salted butter softened (3 sticks)
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 cups sugar
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
- 3 eggs divided
- 1/4 cup almonds sliced or finely chopped
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F and line one or two baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, mix together softened butter (1.5 cups), baking powder (1/2 teaspoon), kosher salt (1/2 teaspoon), and flour (4 cups) with an electric hand mixer until well blended and the texture resembles coarse sand.
- Add the sugar (1.5 cups) and mix until well combined.
- Add the vanilla extract (2 teaspoons) and almond extract (1/2 teaspoon) and two of the eggs, then mix until well combined.
- Using a small cookie scoop, measure out equal portions of the dough and roll into balls. Place on baking sheet and, using your thumb, press on the center of each ball to create a small indentation (if you find that the dough is too sticky, keep a small bowl of water next to you to dip your thumb into every so often).
- Beat remaining egg in a small bowl and brush the tops and sides of each indented cookie with the egg. Sprinkle with the almonds.
- Bake for 16 minutes, or until cookies are only JUST beginning to brown.
Notes
- For a nut free version, omit the almond extract and the almonds.
- The provided nutrition information does not include any added sodium from seasoning to taste, any optional ingredients, and it does not take brands into account. Feel free to calculate it yourself using this calculator or by adding the recipe to Yummly.
Nutrition
Nutrition Information Disclaimer
The provided nutrition information is my best estimate and reflects one serving of the recipe (total servings indicated at top of recipe card). It does not include any added sodium from seasoning to taste, any optional ingredients, and it does not take brands into account. I use an automatic API to calculate this information. Feel free to calculate it yourself using one of these tools:
Leigh R
I made these last Christmas as a gift box items for friends & neighbors. I live in Southern Indiana where there is no Scandinavian presence so it was fun to introduce some yummy Norwegian treats to the locals. I recommend using clear vanilla, bleached flour, whisked egg whites rather than the whole egg for brushing & white sanding salt (to sprinkle on top with the almonds) if you’re making at Christmas. These changes really make for a beautiful presentation. But you can’t go wrong with this scrumptious recipe as is!
Elizabeth Lindemann
So glad you liked it! Thanks for the suggestion to use clear vanilla and egg whites – I bet that made the color gorgeous!
Judy
Excellent cookie. Delicate flavors and lovely texture. Easy to make and better if you give them a chance to cool before you eat them. I’ll be making them for our church sale and I’m sure they will go over very well.
Elizabeth Lindemann
So glad you liked them!
Barbie
Just as you described and delicious!
Elizabeth Lindemann
So glad you liked them!
Wendy
I’m so excited to try these. My grandma taught me some amazing Norwegian recipes and I wish I had learned more from her. Have you ever heard of tine pannekakers, kringlas or noodle kadovels?
Elizabeth Lindemann
I’ve never heard of any of those! We always had some blotkake, kransekake, and fyrstekake growing up. And Norwegian waffles, which I’m going to write a recipe post for soon! I’ll have to look up all of these- thanks! Hope you liked the cookies :-)
Dorraine araiza
I just pulled my first batch out of the oven and they are wonderful!! So easy to make.
Thanks for the recipe!!
Elizabeth Lindemann
So glad you liked the recipe!
Tammy Ross
What do you think the conversion would be for granulated sugar to powdered sugar?
Thank you
Tammy 😀
Elizabeth Lindemann
Hm, I’ve never tried this, and I don’t think I’d recommend substituting powdered sugar for granulated sugar. Powdered sugar is ground much finer, which will affect the texture of the cookies, and it also contains some cornstarch as well to prevent caking. That said, I’m all about experimenting! While I can’t say that the results will work out for you, some digging online told me that the rule is 1 3/4 cups powdered sugar for every 1 cup of granulated sugar. Hope that helps!
Shirley
I want to make these for a lovely Norwegian couple. I will be visiting them just before Thanksgiving. Can I just bake a couple of trays of these and freeze the rest of the dough for Christmas?
Elizabeth Lindemann
Hm, that’s a great question. I have frozen the baked cookies before with good results, but I’ve never frozen cookie dough. I did come across this helpful resource though- looks like it’s recommended to freeze the dough portioned out into cookies already- hope this helps! https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/baking-basics-how-to-freeze-cookie-dough/
Doreen
Prep time and cook time is a typo, right? Says over 6 hours.
Elizabeth Lindemann
Um yes, that’s definitely a typo! Fixing now. Thanks for the heads up!
Susan
We have friends moving to Norway in September and a dinner with them tonight. Ran across these cookies and had to make them. They are beautiful and tasty. Perfect! Thanks!
Elizabeth Lindemann
So glad you liked them! What a fun treat to make for your friends :-)
Kelly
I have always fail baking cookies but your recipe is so awesome! I finally success in my baking cookies! Thank you so much!
Elizabeth
Aw yay! So happy this worked out for you!
Ruth
Question, I had a previous recipe and the sugar was confectioners sugar but yours is sugar-sugar right? The rest of the recipe was about the same?
Elizabeth
Yes, I used sugar-sugar, not confectioners sugar! Although I am intrigued- maybe I’ll have to try that next time! I bet the texture would be completely different.
2pots2cook
Oh boy! Thanks to you I am changing my “to bake” list. Thank you very much and have a nice day !
RossC
I don’t bake much but, I am looking forward to baking these cookies..
I like your take on salted vs unsalted butter and I have looked at but never picked up Irish butter but certainly will now…
Elizabeth
Hope you like the recipe! And yes, PLEASE pick up the Irish butter as soon as you possibly can :-)
RossC
Baked these this morning, with Kerigold butter of course…
I’m not a baker but, you would think I am from tasting these…
Wonderful recipe… Thank you… :O)