Pre-heat the oven to 350 and line a cookie sheet with a silicone mat or parchment paper. Set up a food processor and combine 3/4 cup of the pignoli nuts, sugar, almond paste and mahlab seeds in its bowl. Pulse them together until they are fine crumbs. Add the vanilla and egg in next and pulse them in until a wet dough. Lastly add the flour, cinnamon, nutmeg and baking powder and pulse them in just until they disappear.

Pour the remaining 1/2 cup of pignoli nuts into a shallow bowl. Then scoop out a mound of dough using a heaping 1.5 inch cookie scoop and roll it into a ball. Roll the ball in the pignoli nuts and gently press the nuts in to coat the dough. Transfer the dough to the lined sheet, press it down into a disc and repeat until you have a dozen cookies on the tray. Bake the spiced pignoli cookies for about 20 minutes, until they are golden and baked through.

When they are done let them cool on the sheet for a couple of minutes, then transfer them to a rack to finish cooling. Enjoy them right away or whenever you'd like. They will keep in a sealed container for 3-4 days!