With the holiday season quickly approaching, many people are scrambling to pull together their favorite holiday treats and dishes. Every year, me and my mom make at least 8 different cookies for my family to enjoy, and that baking takes at least 4-5 days. We started baking on Saturday afternoon and we just finished on Wednesday morning, which is a long time to be just baking cookies.
Not being able to get together with family this year is upsetting, but that doesn't mean we have to stop our baking traditions!
My family loves to try out new recipes and go back to the classics, so we always have a wide variety of treats. Here are some of my favorite cookies to bake around the holiday season!
1. Sugar Cookies
These are the classic go to Christmas dessert for my family. My mom is known for her sugar cookies and icing at every family Christmas gathering. Our family likes them so much that on most years she bakes a double recipe so our relatives can take them home after!
Sugar cookies are also great because every year my family decorates them together, usually the day before Christmas Eve at night. We spend a few hours decorating about 8 dozen cookies and then end up watching Elf as a little tradition that we do, and it's super fun!
Overall, these cookies are one of the best holiday desserts you can make, and are always a crowd pleaser.
2. Mint Chocolate Cookies
These are my favorite cookie to make, and I'm usually the only one that ends up baking them. They're so rich of chocolate and sugar, and are always a fan favorite.
Once you pull the chocolate cookies out of the oven, you drop an andies mint candy on top, let it melt, and then spread it around the cookie.
It is one of my all time favorite cookies, between the chocolate and mint flavor, and the chewy texture in the middle; its overall one of my favorites, so much so that my family calls them "Anna's chocolate cookies".
3. Thumb prints
Thumb prints are another cookies that my mom is known for. We use the exact same icing we do for the sugar cookies, so it's really nice to not have to make different icing recipes.
Thumb prints are a fairly complicated cookies; from the dough being so sticky, having to dip it in egg whites, then roll it around in chopped walnuts; it's a lot of work for one cookie.
In the end, the work is worth it because these are the best cookies around! These are usually the first cookies gone from our family gatherings and everyone always asks for the recipe!
4. Peanut Butter Blossoms
A classic go-to Christmas cookie for everyone. These cookies never disappoint and always turn out so good. They're such a versatile cookie, I've never heard of anyone not liking them before!
The best part about cooking them is that you don't have to grease a cookie sheet, since the peanut butter keeps it from sticking. I know that doesn't sound all that great, but I promise it's the best to not have to grease a cookie sheet, it saves such a hassle.
5. Italian Pignoli Cookies
My mom recently started making these a few years ago, and they are such a unique cookie. The main ingredient for the dough is almond paste, so you do have to go a special Italian market to find it, but it's so worth it.
These cookies are not very sweet, since it's mostly just almond paste as a dough and it's rolled in pine nuts, but it is actually so delicious. They're a very different cookie that you don't see at too many Christmas celebrations, so they can add a little bit of "spice" to your usual line up if sweet cookies.
I hope you try out some of these cookies that my family loves, and maybe they'll become part of your family's holiday tradition too!
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