National Pecan Sandies Day

National Pecan Sandies Day comes around on June 23 every year, and whether you say it as ‘pee-can’ or ‘peh-kahn,’ we give you all the reasons to be excited about this textured, crunchy, buttery, tree nut.

  Cookies make everything infinitely better, so we don’t doubt that this will have you coming back for more. Firstly, what is a pecan sandy, and what’s with the name? The sandy (or ‘sablé’) is a type of sugar or shortbread cookie. The word ‘sablé’ is French, meaning ‘sandy,’ due to the crumbly texture of the cookie, which comes from the sandy, breadcrumb-like texture when mixing the flour and butter. The name also works because of the sandy color of the cookie. The traditional pecan sandy has a toasted pecan pressed into the cookie and is garnished with a flurry of powdered sugar. Furthermore, since this is a type of mildly sweet shortbread cookie, it melts in the mouth and goes amazingly with a glass of cold milk or a hot beverage like tea.

 The name ‘Sandies’ was registered by the Keebler Company (an American cookie manufacturer) as a brand name in 1955, which they used for their line of shortbread cookies. They introduced the pecan sandy then and, later on, added other variations.   

Other world cultures have very similar cookies to pecan sandies, which are generically called ‘snowball cookies’ and have their own specific names depending on their country of origin.  For example in in countries like Malaysia, it is referred to as an ‘Arab biscuit’.

Differing from pecan sandies only in shape, snowball cookies are rolled into balls and doused with powdered sugar (resembling snowballs — hence the name) and contain pecans as part of the dough. They are also known as ‘Mexican wedding cookies,’ ‘Russian tea cakes,’ and ‘Danish wedding cookies.’ Whatever the country of origin, though, we are sure glad they exist, and that they continue to be a favorite for people around the globe.