Terrific Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies

I found a easy recipe for gluten-free peanut butter cookies on the much-loved Gluten-Free Girl blog. I've been hoping to make a gluten-free dessert for a party this weekend, and these are terrific. I'm so excited to have a gluten-free baked goods recipe that doesn't call for exotic ingredients--the rice flour, sorghum flour, xanthan gum, etcetera. Anyone can make these with ordinary pantry ingredients.

My recipe is similar to Gluten-Free Girl's, but I did a few things differently. Here's the recipe with my alterations.

Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies

1 c. creamy unsalted natural peanut butter
1 c. white sugar
1 t. baking powder
1 egg
3/4 t. salt

for rolling: white sugar, brown sugar, course salt

Preheat the oven to 350°.

Cream the peanut butter and sugar in a bowl with a hand mixer, then beat in the baking powder, egg, and salt. Mix until it is all well combined. (If you are using salted peanut butter, you won't need to add as much additional salt.)

Make your rolling mixture: Combine equal amounts of brown sugar and white sugar, about 1/4 cup each. Add salt a pinch at a time, until it tastes pleasantly sweet-salty.

Roll some dough into a small ball, with a circumference about the size of a quarter. Roll the ball in the sugar-salt mixture. Line a baking sheet, covered in parchment paper, with sugary balls of dough. Gently flatten each ball twice with a fork, to create a crosshatch pattern.

Bake in the oven for about 12 minutes. The cookies will be slightly brown around the edges. Take the tray out of the oven and let the cookies rest for ten minutes. Resist handling them sooner--they need to firm up to prevent breakage. Then carefully transfer them to a cooling rack until fully cooled.