Gourmet Cookie Bouquets Recipe Blog

Posts Tagged ‘cookie recipes’

Spritz cookies have been a Christmas staple in our family for at least 30 years.  My Mom has a really old-fashioned cookie press that you have to twist to extract the cookies….personally I like the trigger version, but mine has been replaced several times (because the plastic broke) while her old one just keeps going and going.  On the plate below, you can see some snowflake design cookies that we made and then just added green and red sugar.  You can also color the dough with food coloring (this is what we do to make green Christmas tree shaped cookies).

1 ½ cups butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
2 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla
½ tsp almond extract
3 ½ cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder

In a large mixing bowl (I use my Kitchen Aid Mixer with the white paddle), cream butter and sugar together. Then add the egg, milk, vanilla, almond extract beating well. Stir together flour and baking powder in a separate bowl or on a piece of wax paper (to make it easy to add to wet ingredients). Gradually add flour mixture to creamed mixture, mixing to a smooth dough. If you are going to add food coloring to the dough, I recommend doing it when you have about half of the flour mixture added so that it is easier to mix in.  Do NOT chill the dough! Shape dough in small logs and place in a cookie press (see the video below for great tips). Choose the press die to create the cookie shape that you want.  Then press cookies onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 375 degF for 10 to 12 minutes or until cookies are lightly browned around edges. Remove cookies from sheet and cool on a rack. Makes 7 to 8 dozen Spritz cookies.

My Tips – If you are making Christmas trees or wreaths, you will likely want to color the dough green. I recommend using the paste type food coloring so that it doesn’t change the consistency of the dough. No matter what the cookie shape, you can decorate them with colored sugars prior to baking in the oven.

Here is a great video that I found at YouTube.  It shows how to load and use a cookie press to make Christmas designs.  It also details how you can take those shapes and arrange them to create a Christmas cookie wreath.

When it comes to baking and decorating sugar cookies for Christmas in my family, we do it assembly line style.  Each person in the family is in charge of a certain aspect of the baking and decorating process. That way we can make A LOT of cookies in a short amount of time.  My favorite job is decorating and each decorator is tasked with one shape so that you can get creative and try all kinds of fun decorations.  I personally like doing the Christmas trees, but my sister likes during the star and holiday ornament shapes.  We actually use a couple different recipes for sugar cookies depending on whether we want crisp cookies that are decorated with colored sugars or egg washes (shared in this post) or thicker more chewy cookies that can hold up to iced decorations.  If you are planning to make thousands of cookies like we do, I would recommend going with the easy-to-decorate cookies that are decorated with small candies and colored sugars.  Icing takes too much time when you are doing that many cookies.  Enjoy!

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 cup butter
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. almond flavoring
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp. cream of tartar
1 tsp. baking soda

Using a large stand mixer or glass bowl, cream the sugar and butter together. Add egg, vanilla and almond flavoring; mixing thoroughly. Sift flour, cream of tartar, and baking soda together and stir in to the wet ingredients. Wrap dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2 to 3 hours. Prior to removing the dough from the refrigerator, preheat oven to 375°F. Divide dough in half and roll out on lightly floured pastry board. Roll thin (1/4″ to 3/8″ thick), but thick enough to cut with a holiday shaped cookie cutter. Dip cutter in flour before each cutting. Use care so that you can cut as many cookies from each rolling as possible. Use a spatula to move cookies from pastry board to a lightly greased cookie sheet. Remaining dough can be rolled again to make more cookies.  Add cookie decorations such as red hot candies, jimmies, colored sugars, confetti candy, M&M’s, and nuts. Bake in 375 degF oven for 7 to 8 minutes or until delicately golden. Remove from baking sheet and cool on a rack.  Store cookies in an airtight container.

My Tips – These sugar cookies are light and crisp in texture so I recommend decorating them with colored sugars and confetti candies rather than a heavy icing.  I found this EXCELLENT video with fun tips and ideas for decorating holiday Christmas cookies with candies, colored sugars, nuts and more.

Another family favorite are these peanut blossom cookies…they are best served with a cup of coffee as the cookies are crisp and crunchy (as opposed to soft and chewy).  I prefer to use Chocolate Hershey Kisses in the center of each cookie because I like the combination of milk chocolate and peanut butter.  Another tip is to heat them up in the microwave for maybe 10 seconds so that the chocolate gets a little melty.  My mouth is watering just thinking about it!

1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
2 Tbsp. milk
1 tsp. vanilla
1 3/4 cups flour
1 tsp. soda
1/2 tsp. salt
Hershey’s chocolate kisses or dark chocolate baking stars

Cream together the shortening, peanut butter, and sugars in a large mixing bowl. Add the egg, milk, and vanilla. Beat well (I use a kitchen aid mixer for this process). On a large piece of waxed paper or in a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients (flour, soda, salt) and then add them a bit at a time to the creamed mixture. Mix well between each dry ingredient addition. Shape by rounded teaspoonful into balls (I prefer to use a #80 cookie scoop to achieve a consistent size). Roll each cookie ball in sugar and place them on ungreased cookie sheet. Be sure to leave a couple inches between the balls so that they don’t run into each other. Bake at 375°F for 8 minutes. Remove cookies from the oven and place a solid Hershey’s Kiss or Chocolate Star on the top of each one pushing down slightly (so that cookie cracks around the edge). Return the cookies to the oven and bake an additional 2 to 4 minutes. Remove cookies from the baking sheet and cool on a rack.

Well I looked at the calendar this morning and realized that Thanksgiving is less than 2 weeks away.  I don’t know what Black Friday means at your house, but at mine, it is the kick-off for holiday baking.  Since I was a little girl, my Mom and Aunts have baked up thousands of goodies to share with all of their family, friends and co-workers.  Over the next several weeks, I am going to share my family’s favorite Christmas cookies. First up on the list are some Christmas wreaths that my Mom happily recreates every year.  They are my Dad’s favorite holiday “cookie” after all!  This recipe is simple enough that the kids can even help make them.

1/2 cup butter
30 marshmallows
3 1/2 cups corn flakes
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1/4 tsp. + green food coloring
Red cinnamon candies

In a double boiler, melt the marshmallows and butter together stirring until smooth.  Add the vanilla and green food color to the mixture.  Note that the key to this recipe is getting the marshmallow mixture green enough to make the shaped cookies look like wreaths. Lastly, add the corn flakes. Blend thoroughly so that corn flakes are fully coated with the marshmallow mixture (we use our hands). While warm (cool slightly), use tablespoon-sized balls of cornflakes shaping them into wreaths with greased fingers. Place on waxed paper or ungreased cookie sheets. Decorate with the red hot candies. Makes 15 to 20 wreaths depending on size.

My Tips – We normally quadruple the batch so we melt the marshmallows and butter in a huge dutch oven on low heat stirring constantly (that way we have enough room to add the corn flakes).  I think we make about 5 quadruple batches total. In addition, my Mom uses way more than a ¼ tsp to get the dark green color shown in the photo.