Dorie Greenspan graced us with these simple cookies from Pâtisserie Arnaud Larher in her book Paris Sweets. These salty, sweet, and buttery cookies are so delicious they’re hard to stop popping into your mouth. Perhaps that’s why they are called “TV crunchies”; they are France’s version of America’s peanuts and popcorn. The best part: These cookies take no time to make and are the opposite of fussy. Very young kids can help shape these imperfect beauties.

This pastry was featured as part of our Parisian Sweets photo gallery.

  • Yield: About 50 cookies
  • Difficulty: Easy
  • Total: About 30 mins
  • Active: About 15 mins

Ingredients (5)

  • 3/4 cup blanched whole almonds
  • 1/2 cup granulated sugar
  • 1/2 teaspoon fine salt
  • 1 cup all-purpose flour
  • 7 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into 7 pieces

Instructions

  1. Heat the oven to 350°F and arrange a rack in the middle. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
  2. Combine almonds, sugar, and salt in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a blade attachment and process until nuts are finely ground, about 2 minutes. Place nut-sugar mixture in a medium bowl; set aside.
  3. Place flour in the bowl of the food processor and, with the motor running, drop in the pieces of cold butter. Once the butter is added, stop the motor and pulse until the mixture is sandy, about 10 (1-second) pulses. Add the reserved nut-sugar mixture, setting aside the bowl it was in, and pulse until the dough forms small curds and clumps, about 20 (1-second) pulses. Transfer to the reserved bowl.
  4. To shape the cookies, form small pieces of dough about the size of cherries. Squeeze them in your hand to form irregularly shaped balls and place on the prepared baking sheet about 1/2 inch apart.
  5. Bake for 5 minutes, then rotate the sheet from front to back. Bake for 8 minutes more, until the cookies are just browned on the bottom and crackly on top (they will still be soft). Let them cool on the baking sheet for 3 minutes, then transfer to a rack to cool completely. The cookies will keep for about 5 days in an airtight container.