Nothing “smells” holidays like hundreds of Christmas cookies fresh out of the oven. I have 6 cookie recipes to share with you today to get you in the spirit of merry baking.
Have you ever spent an afternoon baking Christmas cookies for the holiday celebrations to come? Well I got together with my friends Catherine and Vitalia and we spent a good 6 hours baking our holiday butt’s off. Yes you read that right, we made at least 200 Christmas Cookies all in one afternoon, and had six balls of dough left to freeze for future ready-to-go batches.
This was my first time baking on such a large scale in one sitting. We went through at least 5 pounds of butter, 4 pounds of sugar, maybe 10 pounds of flour and 24 eggs. Every recipe was doubled or tripled. The chocolate chip cookie dough did not even make it to the oven at all. We may have been a bit over ambitious but what a great way to spend time with friends! We had 1 guy who was our volunteer dishwasher and plenty of alcohol to sip throughout the day. It is very important to stay hydrated lol.
Picking my favorite Christmas cookies would be a tough call. All the recipes turned out well (even with mishaps in preparation) but if I had to pick one I would go with the Mint Chocolate Whoopie Pies because I love chocolate so much. The mint really gave them also that holiday feel. Close runner ups are the Macaroon and Palmier.
Here are the 6 cookies we made:
The Sugar Cookies from In Katrina’s Kitchen.
The Palmiers were from a Martha Stewart magazine issue Holiday Cookies issue 2001.
The Macaroons were from a Martha Stewart magazine Holiday Cookies issue 2001.
The Gingerbread Cookies are from Ricardo.
Austria Vanillekipferl from The Ambassador’s Table.
The Mint Chocolate Whoopie Pies were baked with chocolate sent to me by Green & Black’s Organic. I got 3 bars infused Mint (with Peppermint oil) for the whoopie pies and 1 bar of Dark Chocolate which was used to drizzle on the Austria Vanillekipferl. I was not happy with the look of the icing but it tasted good.
Green & Black’s Organic Mint Chocolate Whoopie Pies
Ingredients
Pie Ingredients
- 125 g 4 oz Unsalted butter at room temperature
- 150 g 5 oz Green & Black’s Organic Mint Chocolate
- 225 g 8 oz Sugar
- 3 Large eggs
- 1 tsp Vanilla extract
- 250 g 9 oz Plain flour
- 30 g 1 oz Good-quality cocoa powder
- 1 ?2 tsp Baking powder
Frosting Ingredients
- 150 g 5 oz Unsalted butter
- 30 ml Semi-skimmed milk
- 150 g 5 oz Icing sugar
- Natural peppermint extract
- Optional Natural green food colouring
Instructions
- Preheat an oven to 180°C (355°F). Line two baking trays with baking parchment.
- Melt the butter and chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of barely simmering water, making sure the bowl does not touch the water. Remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly.
- Whisk the sugar, eggs and vanilla in a separate bowl for about three minutes or until light, fluffy and pale in colour, then fold in the chocolate mixture.
- Sift the flour, cocoa and baking powder together and fold into the mixture.
- Place tablespoons of the mixture onto the baking trays (the mixture should make about 20
- biscuits) and bake for 10–12 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
- For the filling, cream the butter, sugar and milk together. Add a few drops of peppermint extract to taste. If desired, finish with a few drops of the natural food coloring until you’re happy with the final color. Cream everything together until light and airy.
- When the pies have cooled, pair them up and apply a layer of filling to one of the flatter sides and sandwich them together. Dust with icing sugar.
Notes
Here are a few candid shots of the day, just for fun.
What is the largest number of cookies that you have baked in one sitting?
Do you bake Christmas cookies every year?
What is your favorite cookie?
Which cookie do you think you would like best out of the 6 recipes here?
WOW! What a day’s work! 200 cookies? This cookie monster would have been going crazy if she had been there. What awesome batches of cookies. Love those Whoopie Pies!!! YUM!
Good or bad crazy MJ lol? Yeah the whoopie psi were in my top 2 for sure!
OMG! The cookies look great Evelyne…I would love to try one of each…you all must have a blast!
Hope you are having a fabulous week 🙂
We had a great time Juliana and I wish I could send you one of each.
wow, I can only manage a few dozen at a time. I must try the Austria Vanillekipferl 🙂
I highly recommend the Austria Vanillekipferl Tandy. For sure alone I would do way less.
OMG, 20 different kind of cookie, looks like heaven for cookie lovers!
6 different kinds but 250 ish cookies lol, it was heaven
That’s a lot of cookies! Even spread out over a few days, but in one day? Wow! Sounds like fun, though. And loads of good eats. 🙂
It was a blast but intense…but rewarding 🙂
So many delicious cookies! We have so many here too not that I am complaining. Although 200+ might be a bit too much for just the two of us 🙂
Oh well it was divided by 3 and we are all gifting some. But yes some weight will be gained at home lol
I can honestly say… I cannot – LOL! They would kill me, LMFAO!
And I can vouch that is true in your case with your allergies lol.
That’s amazing! I’d like to try the macaroons 🙂 I think the largest amount of cookies I baked in one sitting was 6 dozen, that was for a bake sale… but it was just one kind of cookie, but you have so many different kinds! Did you have to stand on the chair to get all these cookies into the picture?
6 dozens is a lot too lol! The macaroons were good indeed. No I have a flip screen on my DSLR so lifted my arms up but could see what I was shooting.
This sounds like my kind of fun—-and all your cookies look wonderful! I’d dive into those macaroons first 🙂
Thanks Liz and I have plenty at home, wish I could pass you a few macaroons through the screen lol
These are all beautiful cookies and are getting me in the holiday spirit! This is a great way to tackle your holiday baking. Nice variety as well. I wonder how they taste…
Amazing Karen…duh, maybe there will be some left when I see you Dec 26th.
o my my my…look at all those cookies!!! It must have been a really fun day.
I really would love to try some of those chocolate whoopie pies.
Thanks Angie and I just so happen to have a whoopie pie on my desk now lol.
What a fun day. My friend Michelle and her family used to come over each year in December and we would spend the day baking. It was always so much fun.
Is was fun and so cool you did the same. you should do it again!
Oh I can handle anything sweet my dear believe me and if I lived close to you I would love to join your cookie marathon!
Well I will have to make sure to sdn you an invite for next year Katerina 🙂