One Dough, Five Christmas Cookies
December 6, 2021
These simple cookies come together with pantry staples. Adding a few extra touches transforms this single dough into 5 unique + festive Christmas cookies!
Wheel of Cookies
The best part of attending a holiday cookie swap? You walk away with two dozen cookies –– without having spent two dozen hours slaving away in the kitchen. But what if you could prepare several batches of cookies using the same basic set of ingredients? Let me show you how you can turn basic sugar cookie dough into five classic holiday cookies in one-fifth the time!
A Sweet Start
The ingredients list for the holiday sugar cookies comes straight from your pantry: flour, baking powder, butter, sugars, salt, vanilla extract and eggs.
Whether you make letter-embossed treats or simple round cookies, a basic sugar cookie always has its place at the holiday table. (They’re perfect for decorating and are universally liked.)
CLICK HERE FOR HOLIDAY SUGAR COOKIE RECIPE
Sugar Canes
A dash of peppermint extract in both the cookies and the icing imbues sugar cookies with candy cane-inspired flavor. Nothing says Christmas quite like Candy Canes!
Set aside some of the icing and tint it red; paint the stripes on top of the solid white icing layer to prevent the red color from bleeding into the cookie. Sprinkle with crushed candy canes once the icing has dried completely.
CLICK HERE FOR PEPPERMINT TWIST CANDY COOKIE RECIPE
Snickerdoodle Snowflakes
A pinch of nutmeg and a couple teaspoons of cinnamon can transform very vanilla cookies into sweetly spiced snickerdoodles. Get creative with your snickerdoodle snowflakes by mixing and matching different-shaped and -sized cutters with patterns drawn on using royal icing.
CLICK HERE FOR SNICKERDOODLE SNOWFLAKE RECIPE
The Sweetest Gift
Two of my favorite classic holiday flavors — maple and pecan — shine BRIGHT in this maple extract-tinted sugar cookie. To give the cookie a touch of penuche’s fudgy texture, I add milk, butter, and sugar to the icing.
Reuse the red royal icing from the candy canes to paint dainty little bows on these petite presents. A cluster of crushed pecans adds the illusion of a patterned gift-wrap, making these Christmas Cookies completely giftable!
CLICK HERE FOR MAPLE PECAN PRESENT COOKIE RECIPE
Salted Caramel Cocoa Cookies
Dutch process cocoa powder makes these sweet stockings distinctly chocolate. They’re perfect for decorating a mini mantel or for stuffing into stockings. Resist the urge to color contrast with a white icing; a drizzle of salted caramel works wonderfully with the chocolate cookie. Embed some crushed sea salt in the stocking’s cuff for some tongue-tingling crunch.
CLICK HERE FOR SALTED CARAMEL CHOCOLATE STOCKING RECIPE
Kathryn Warren Says
This might be a dumb question, but I was wondering if we have to join the recipe club to get some of the recipes shown on Instagram?