Tag-Archive for ◊ Christmas Cookies ◊

10 Dec 2010 Peppermint Bark Cookies
Author:  |  Category: Cookies & Bars, Holidays & Events, Sweets, Twelve Days of Christmas Cookies  | Tags: , , , , , , , ,  | One Comment

Mmmmm…, the flavors of Christmas! For me they are gingerbread, eggnog and peppermint.  Last December Bon Appetit magazine featured this Peppermint Bark Cookie. It’s a shortbread base topped with melted chocolate, crushed candy canes, and then drizzled with white chocolate.  When cooled this bar cookie is broken into irregular pieces. Yes, a bar cookie!  This is a very easy cookie to make!

I can’t think of anything more Christmas-y than a plate of Gingerbread Folk, Egg Nog Spritz, and Peppermint Bark Cookies…, with Tangerine Sugar Cookies, Jam Pinwheels, Caramel Bars, Chocolate-Caramel Coconut Bars AND my soon-to-be-posted White Chocolate Spice Cookies, too 🙂

Peppermint Bark Cookies

2 cups flour
¼ teaspoon salt
1 cup butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 large egg yolk
6 ounces (approx 1 cup) bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped (try to use a better chocolate than chocolate chips)
½ – ¾ cup finely chopped red-and-white striped hard peppermint candy canes ( 6 – 8 candy canes)
3 oz. (½ cup) white chocolate (such as Lindt or Perugina–no white chocolate chips if you want really, really good flavor)

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
  2. Spray a jelly roll pan or quarter sheet pan with nonstick spray. Line bottom of pan with long strip of 9-inch-wide parchment paper, leaving overhang on both short sides of pan.
  3. Whisk flour and salt in medium bowl.
  4. Using electric mixer, beat butter in large bowl until creamy, about 2 minutes. Gradually beat in sugar. Continue beating until mixture is light and fluffy about 3 minutes more. Beat in vanilla, then egg yolk. Gradually add flour mixture, beating on low speed just to blend.
  5. Using moistened fingertips, press dough to form even layer over bottom of pan. Pierce dough all over with fork. Bake until light golden brown and slightly puffed and edges begin to come away from sides of pan, about 30 minutes (check after 20, mine got overcooked).
  6. Place pan on rack; immediately sprinkle chopped chocolate over hot shortbread. Let stand until chocolate softens, about 3 minutes. Using small offset spatula, spread chocolate over top of cookie in thin even layer. Immediately sprinkle chopped peppermint candies over the melted chocolate.
  7. Melt white chocolate (I put in a small freezer Ziplock and MW-ed on 50% power for 90 sec. Squished to melt, cut a hole in corner of bag and drizzled over chocolate and candy canes). Drizzle white chocolate all over cookies. Chill until white chocolate is set, about 30 minutes.
  8. Using paper overhang as aid, lift cookie from pan and transfer to work surface. Using large knife, cut cookie into irregular pieces.

DO AHEAD: Can be made 1 week ahead. Store in refrigerator in airtight containers between layers of waxed paper or parchment paper.

The cookie plate is looking spectacular now, isn’t it?

Thanks for stopping by my kitchen so often.  This is FUN!

09 Dec 2010 Tangerine Sugar Cookies
Author:  |  Category: Cookies & Bars, Holidays & Events, Sweets, Twelve Days of Christmas Cookies  | Tags: , , , ,  | 5 Comments

This cookie is new to me this year, but I think it will be making regular appearances from here on out.  I was a little hesitant to make this cookie because it has olive oil in it.  Olive oil?  I know olive oil is great in spaghetti sauce, but in a cookie?  I was about ready to turn the page when I saw cornmeal also on the list of ingredients.  If you’ve never had a cookie with cornmeal in it, you’re missing out.   I simply love the delicate crunch of cornmeal in a cookie.  I was imagining that cornmeal crunch with some tangerine sugar, and I was beginning to think  that the olive oil might actually work.  And it did!

This recipe was #83 in the Better Homes and Gardens 100 Best Cookies Special Interest Publication.  In my opinion, it should be rated much higher than #83, but they didn’t think about rolling the cookies in tangerine sugar.  That was my idea! If they had thought of it, they’d be putting these cookies in their top dozen.

One more thing, it does  seem like there is a lot of butter and oil in this recipe, and there is, but there is also 4 cups of flour.  This recipe makes a BIG batch of cookies, about 7 dozen–more than enough for the cookie swap, or for sharing with the neighbors 🙂

Tangerine Sugar Cookies

  • ¾ cup butter, at room temperature
  • 1 ½ cups sugar
  • 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
  • 1 ½ teaspoons cream of tartar
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 2 eggs
  • grated peel of three tangerines (at least 1 tablespoon grated peel)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 teaspoon orange extract
  • ¾ cup olive oil
  • ½ cup cornmeal
  • 4 cups flour
  • tangerine sugar (mix 1/2 cup sugar with grated rind of 3 tangerines,  air dry in a thin layer on a cookie sheet for at least an hour before using)
  1. Prepare tangerine sugar and set aside to dry.
  2. Beat butter with an electric mixer for about a minute.  Add the sugar, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt to the butter.  Beat until mixture is light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.
  3. Beat in eggs, one at a time, tangerine peel, vanilla and orange extract then gradually drizzle in the olive oil, beating constantly.
  4. Combine flour and cornmeal and then beat into the butter-egg-olive oil mixture.
  5. Cover dough and chill for 30 to 60 minutes, or until dough is easy to handle.
  6. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
  7. Remove dough from refrigerator and roll into 1 inch balls.
  8. Roll balls in tangerine sugar and coat completely.
  9. Place balls 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet (I baked mine on parchment lined cookie sheets)
  10. Flatten dough balls slightly with slight press of three fingers or the palm of your hand.
  11. If desired, press a design into the top of the cookie.  You could make an  “X” or “///” design with a wooden skewer or toothpick.  Or you could use a special cookie cutter that leaves impressions of (for example) santa faces or angels. To get the flower design in my cookie, I used a fondant cutter.
  12. Bake cookies in preheated 350 degree oven for 9 to 11 minutes or just until tops are lightly browned.
  13. Transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.  Store at room temperature for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 3 months.

Thanks for stopping by my kitchen today.  It’s always fun to see you.  Stop by again tomorrow and I’ll have a few more GREAT cookie recipes to share with you!

06 Dec 2010 Chocolate-Caramel-Coconut Bars
Author:  |  Category: Cookies & Bars, Holidays & Events, Twelve Days of Christmas Cookies, Uncategorized  | Tags: , , , , , , , ,  | 3 Comments

So sorry, so sorry. I’m a bit  behind on my Christmas Cookie postings.  Blame it on the drain!  There have been many, many men visiting me this last week.  Unfortunately, they are only interested in messing with my pipes and taking my money. Lots of my money went out the door with one man today, lots more went with another man last week, more will go tomorrow with a third man<sigh> and I still can’t use the sink, the dishwasher, or the washing machine.  What’s this got to do with Christmas cookies and posting recipes?  Not much, I guess.  My computer still works.  My fingers aren’t broken.  My Christmas spirit has suffered a bit, but not posting recipes for GREAT Christmas cookies is not helping.  So let’s get to it!

Coconut Bars are a new addition to my repertoire this year.  Over the past month or so I’ve spent a bit of time trying to cook my way through The Gourmet Cookie Book: The Single Best Recipe From Each Year 1941-2009 by Gourmet Magazine.  I’ve liked a lot of the cookies, but I’ve been tempted to fiddle with each one of them.  Why?  I’m not sure.  Maybe I’m crazy.  Maybe I have too much free time.  Maybe I have serious gym avoidance issues (the latter is the closest to the truth)…

I loved the base of Gourmet’s Chocolate Coconut Squares on page 124 (which Gourmet declared the best cookie of 1997) , but simply hated the ganache topping they used.  It took a few tries, four or more, before I got a version I liked.  My version has Gourmet’s base, a caramel layer (from a Saltine Toffee Cookie recipe), and then some melted chocolate to “gild the lily” as my friend Louise is fond of saying.  It’s decadence.  Candy bar decadence. The recipe makes a 9 x 13 inch panful.  Cut the bars small, and you can feed the neighborhood! Bars will keep a week or more when covered and refrigerated.

Several of the taste testers asked for the recipe and that’s  ALWAYS a good sign!  So here it is, my recipe (inspired by Gourmet’s Chocolate Coconut Squares) for Chocolate-Caramel-Coconut Bars.  I’m thinking of calling them “Triple C Bars”… 🙂

Chocolate-Caramel-Coconut Bars

Bottom Layer

  • 20 whole graham crackers (one 4-portioned cracker counts as one whole cracker)
  • ¾ cup melted butter (1 ½ sticks)
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • 10 oz. sweetened flaked coconut (about 4 cups)

Middle Layer

  • ½ cup butter
  • ½ cup dark brown sugar

Top Layer

  • 1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips (or approx 5 oz. chopped good quality chocolate)
  • ¼ cup sweetened flaked coconut (optional)
  1. Preheat oven to 350º. Line a 9 x 13 inch pan with baking parchment or foil.  Spray the paper with Pam or grease with a bit of softened butter.
  2. Place the graham crackers in a food processor, and pulse until the graham crackers are finely ground and no large chunks remain.
  3. Melt butter in the microwave, stir in salt, and then pour mixture over graham cracker crumbs in food processor.  Pulse a few times to blend.
  4. Remove buttered crumbs from food processor and add to flaked coconut.
  5. Press coconut mixture into the bottom of prepared pan.
  6. Bake base layer in preheated 350º oven for 15 minutes.
  7. About 5 minutes before coconut base layer is due to be taken out of oven, melt butter for caramel layer in a small saucepan. Stir in brown sugar. Stir to dissolve and then boil mixture for five minutes.  Remove from heat.
  8. Pour caramel layer over graham coconut base and then bake for an additional 5 minutes.
  9. Remove pan from oven and sprinkle chocolate chips or chopped chocolate over caramel.  Let sit for 5 minutes.
  10. Using an offset spatula, spread the now melted chocolate evenly over the caramel layer.  Sprinkle ¼ cup coconut over smoothed chocolate. Let bars sit to cool completely.  Place in refrigerator to speed up the hardening of the chocolate, if desired.
  11. When bars are completely cool, remove from pan with foil or parchment.  Remove foil or parchment from bars and then cut into desired size. I cut mine into 2-bite bars, about 1 ½ inches by ¾ inch.

OK, the Christmas spirit is creeping back!  We have the  makings of a nice cookie tray… Gingerbread Folk, Jam Pinwheels, Caramel Bars, Egg Nog Spritz and Chocolate-Caramel-Coconut Bars. Next up?  Tangerine Sugar Cookies! Thanks for stopping by my kitchen today. You cheered me up immensely!

05 Dec 2010 Eggnog Spritz Cookies
Author:  |  Category: Cookies & Bars, Sweets, Twelve Days of Christmas Cookies  | Tags: , , , , ,  | 3 Comments

I feel asleep. In my chair. In front of the TV. I think it had something to do with watching my 2 year old grandson from 9 AM to midnight.  Nevertheless, I missed posting cookie number four of my “Twelve Days of Christmas Cookies” special, oooops! That just means that I’ll have to play catch up and post two Christmas Cookie recipes today!

The recipe I meant to post yesterday was this Eggnog Spritz recipe.  I’ve been making these spritz cookies for so long, two cookie presses ago,  that I have no memory of where I got the original recipe.  My friend Anne had received some of these cookies in her Christmas Cookie box in 1999, and last year she tried to make them for herself  (when I give people cookies, I always include the recipe)…  Unfortunately, she wasn’t happy with them.  She said they weren’t as strongly flavored as she remembered them.  Well, that wasn’t good.  So this year, I upped the nutmeg and the rum flavoring.   We don’t want the memory of an eggnog flavor in these cookies, we want eggnog flavor! Anne came over for a little taste test last night, and was quite happy with this version.  Me, too!  There’s no cookie in the world that won’t benefit from a bit more nutmeg!

Eggnog Spritz Cookies

  • 3 ½ cups all purpose flour (I always use unbleached all purpose flour)
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg (make sure it is fresh, a bottle from a few years ago won’t have much flavor)
  • 1 ½ cups butter (3 sticks), at room temperature
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 3 egg yolks
  • ½ teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 ½ teaspoons rum extract
  • Nutmeg Sugar (mix 1 tablespoons sugar with 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg)
  • Freshly grated nutmeg, if desired
  1. Preheat oven to 400º.
  2. In a medium bowl combine flour, baking powder and nutmeg. Stir to combine.
  3. In the bowl of electric mixer cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Stir in egg yolks, vanilla, and rum extracts.  Beat until well combined.
  4. With mixer running, gradually add flour mixture to butter-sugar mixture.  Dough should be very soft.
  5. Force dough through a cookie press and onto ungreased or parchment lined cookie sheets.  I usually make the small star shaped spritz cookie, but the manual cookie press I borrowed (my second cookie press-one battery operated, one electric-just burned out) didn’t have a star disk, I just made long logs, baked them, and then broke into pieces.  This works, but it’s not as attractive as individual star shaped cookies 🙂
  6. Sprinkle cookies with nutmeg sugar. If desired, add an extra grating of freshly grated whole nutmeg over the cookies.
  7. Bake in preheated 400º oven for 6-7 minutes.
  8. Cool cookies on tray for a minute, and them remove to a rack to cool completely.  Makes approximately 5 dozen small spritz cookies.

Sorry I was sleeping when you stopped by my kitchen yesterday, but I’m you came back today though!  I’ll post another recipe just as soon as I return from a little Christmas shopping!  I have to find a Bundt cake pan for my daughter.  Next year she and I are tempted to join in the month of  “I Like Big Bundts” bake-a-thon! It sounds like so much fun!!

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