Bake delicious holiday cookies with easy step-by-step recipes! With these 5 delicious Christmas cookie recipes to choose from, you will find your new favorites in no time! They are wicked good!

Divinity Cookies

Makes 40 | Prep time 10 minutes | Baking time 10 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ¾ teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• Pinch of salt
• 1 large egg, room temperature
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup cinnamon chips, finely chopped

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).
2. In a large mixing bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Set aside.
3. In another bowl, mix the butter and granulated sugar until creamy and fluffy.
4. Stir in the eggs and mix in the vanilla.
5. Fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and form a dough.
6. Mix in the cinnamon chips.
7. Add spoonfuls of the dough onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
8. Make crisscross incisions in the cookies with a fork.
9. Bake in the oven for about 10 minutes.
10. Let cool completely on the baking sheets before serving.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories 85, fat 4.8 g, carbs 9.9 g, sugar 5 g, Protein 0.9 g, sodium 63 mg

 

Quick and Easy Gingerbread Man Cookies

Makes 30 | Prep time 25 minutes | Chill time 1-2 hours | Baking time 12 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 (3½-ounce) package cook-and-serve butterscotch pudding mix
• ½ cup butter
• ½ cup light brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1½ cups all-purpose flour
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
• 1½ teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Royal icing

• 4 cups powdered sugar
• 3 tablespoons meringue powder
• 10 tablespoon water, at room temperature, more if needed
• Coloring food gels in red, and green (optional)

Directions

1. In a large mixing bowl, mix the flour, pudding mix, baking soda, ground ginger, and cinnamon. Set aside.
2. In another bowl, beat the butter and brown sugar together until fluffy and creamy. Stir in the egg.
3. Fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and form a soft dough.
4. Cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1-2 hours.
5. Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).
6. On a lightly floured working surface, roll out the dough. Cut the cookies with gingerbread man cookie cutters. Arrange them onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
7. Bake in the oven for about 10-12 minutes.
8. Let cool completely on the baking sheets.
9. To make the royal icing, fit the whisk on an electric mixer. Beat the powdered sugar, meringue powder, and 10 tablespoons of water on high speed for 2 minutes. Adjust consistency with more water, 1 tablespoon at a time or it’s too thin, add some powdered sugar. If desired, add some of the royal icing to clean bowls to make red and green colors. Add a few drops of the coloring gel.
10. Decorate with cookies with royal icing as desired.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories 62, fat 3.3 g, carbs 9.8 g, sugar 2.4 g, Protein 0.9 g, sodium 171 mg

 

Snowball Cookies

Makes 30 | Prep time 15 minutes | Chill time 1 hour | Baking time 10 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 cup butter, softened
• ½ cup powdered sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2¼ cups all-purpose flour
• 1 cup pecans, finely chopped
• ½ cups powdered sugar for rolling

Directions

1. In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter with powdered sugar.
2. Stir in the vanilla.
3. Fold in the flour, salt, and chopped pecans.
4. Cover the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.
5. Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).
6. Form small balls out of the dough and arrange the cookies on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
7. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (180°C) for 10–12 minutes.
8. Let cool slightly and roll twice in powdered sugar while still warm.
9. Store in a cookie tin box or cookie jar and serve when needed.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories 161, fat 11.2 g, carbs 14.2 g, sugar 6.2 g, Protein 1.8 g, sodium 48 mg

 

Glazed Italian Christmas Cookies

Makes 60 | Prep time 15 minutes | Chill time 2 hours | Baking time 25 minutes

Ingredients

• ½ cup butter
• 2 cups white sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 3 tablespoons baking powder
• 2 tablespoons pure vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoons pure almond extract
• 4 cups flour

Frosting

• 2 cup icing sugar
• ½ cup milk
• 1 teaspoon almond pure extract
• Food coloring, if desired
• Sugar sprinkle for decoration, if desired

Directions

1. With an electric mixer, cream the butter and the sugar until smooth.
2. Add the eggs one by one, beating at medium speed.
3. Add the baking powder and vanilla and almond extract.
4. Gradually add the flour one cup at a time. Mix until you have a ball of firm dough.
5. Split the dough in two, and form two balls. Wrap in plastic wrap, and chill dough in the refrigerator for 2 hours.
6. Preheat the oven to 375°F, and place the oven rack in the middle position.
7. Place one of the dough balls on a lightly floured surface. Roll out the dough to ¼” thick. Cut the cookies out using Christmas-shaped cookie cutters. Keep the second dough balls in the refrigerator until you are ready to use it.
8. Place the cutout cookies on ungreased cookie sheets lined with parchment paper.
9. Place in the preheated oven, and bake for 8-10 minutes, until the edges of the cookies start to brown.
10. Remove from the oven, and let the cookies rest for 10 minutes before placing them on a wire rack. Let cool down completely before glazing them.
11. While the cookies are cooling down, you can prepare the glaze. In a small bowl, place the icing sugar. Add the almond extract and just enough milk to make a nice frosting consistency.
12. To glaze, dip the top of the cooled-down cookies into the glaze. Decorate with pearls or colored sugar or sprinkles.
13. Let dry completely before serving.

 

Christmas Tree Meringue Cookies

Makes 48 | Prep time 30 minutes | Baking time 2 hours +

Ingredients

• 4 large egg whites
• 1⅓ cups superfine sugar
• ¼ teaspoon cream of tarter
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• ¼ teaspoon peppermint extract (optional)
• Green food coloring (gel is preferred, and just a little is needed))
• Green gel writing frosting (optional)
• 1 oz. semi-sweet chocolate (optional)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 150°F, and place the oven rack in the middle position.
2. With the electric mixer larger bowl beat the egg whites on high speed until foamy and white.
3. Add the cream of tartar, the salt, and the peppermint extract if desired. Continue beating at high speed until soft peaks form.
4. Add the sugar very, very slowly as the mixer continues to beat the egg white mixture on medium-low speed. It should take exactly 7 minutes. This step is important. It will make your meringue light and fluffy. It can be useful to set a timer not to lose track of the time you need to incorporate the sugar.
5. Add a few drops of green food coloring, and mix it in with a spatula or wooden spoon until you get the desired color shade.
6. Place the meringue mixture in a piping bag already set with a star-shaped tip.
7. Cut some parchment paper to fit the bottom of a large cookie sheet.
8. Set a piping bag with the star fitting tip. Pipe the meringue in a continuous movement to shape small Christmas trees with a pointing tip finish, about 1” apart from each other.
9. Bake for 2 hours to 2½ hours until the meringue cookies are dry and crispy.
10. Check often on the meringue cookies after 1¾ hours so they do not start to brown.
11. Remove from oven. Let cool on a wired rack.
12. To make the chocolate star to decorate the treetop, place a cookie sheet in the freezer for 10 to 15 minutes until it is very cold.
13. Reverse the cookie sheet on your working surface so the bottom is facing you.
14. Melt the chocolate in the microwave for about 30 seconds, until it’s all melted but not burned. Let it cool down for about 2 minutes.
15. Place the melted chocolate in a fabric piping bag set with the smallest round tip.
16. Draw in one movement the star shape on the back of the cold cookie sheet. Make as many as you have meringue for.
17. Wait until the chocolate star is completely cooled down to remove them delicately with a spatula.
18. Carefully glue a star onto each meringue treetop with the green writing gel frosting. Add some gel frosting on the Christmas tree if desired to create shade.
19. Sprinkle with powdered sugar to imitate snow.

 

Note: take into account that if you are making these meringue cookies to give, it’s hard to make a nice packaging with the chocolate star since they are very fragile and will probably break.

 

 

***These recipes and more can be found in Louise Davidson’s Wicked Good Cookies:  101 Cookie Recipes that Won’t Make it to the Cookie Jar! To get your own copy, click on the cover or here.

To save and download a copy of the recipes, click here.