I was very excited to learn about the Food Blogger Cookie Swap this year.  I love getting mail from random strangers, I love cookies and I love the food blogging community so everything about it appealed to me, including the opportunity to donate to Cookies for Kids’ Cancer.

I decided to make a recipe I’ve had in my Evernote recipe notebook for years but never got around to making, an Algerian treat called “Bousou La Tmssou” or some variation of that.  These are adorable little things made very simply with powdered sugar, ghee (clarified butter), flour and orange blossom water.  I tweaked it slightly; instead of orange blossom water, I used rose water for half and lemon water (a couple teaspoons of lemon extract in a cup of water) for half.

Rose water is an interesting flavor to eat.  It was very floral but took some getting used to.  I really liked the lemon water.  The cookies were actually really good without any flavoring at all.  Plus, they were cute and very easy.  I’m going to make them again in a variety of flavors for Christmas!

Check out the amazing original recipe and easy step by step instructions for this cookie on the Orange Blossom Water blog.