Bachelor Buttons

Bachelor buttons are old-school English tea cookies, so named because they’re small enough to pop in your mouth in one bite. A few flips through any Victorian cookery book and you’ll find variations of these going back nearly two centuries. Six ingredients, no leavening, and a whisper of nutmeg for warmth.

The technique is closer to making shortbread than drop cookies. Cold butter rubbed into flour with your fingertips until the mixture looks like coarse meal gives them their characteristic tender, crumbly bite. Skip the creaming step that softens butter, and you skip the toughness that comes with it.

Roll into walnut-sized balls, dust with sugar, and bake just until the edges and bottoms barely color. Tops should stay pale, almost white. That’s the whole charm of these cookies. Overbake them and they go from delicate teatime treat to ordinary sugar cookie.

Pro Tips

• Keep the butter cold. Warm butter ruins the crumbly texture.
• Moisten or flour your hands as the recipe says. Sticky dough makes ugly balls.
• Watch them at 7 minutes. They go from pale to brown faster than you’d think.
• Cool completely before storing. Warm cookies trap steam and go soft.

Variations

• Add finely grated lemon zest to the dough for a brighter flavor.
• Swap nutmeg for a pinch of cardamom or mace for a Middle Eastern twist.
• Press a thumbprint into each ball before baking and fill with jam after cooling.