When you give a Santa a cookie…

With the holiday festivities in full swing, we’re up to our ears in sweets and sugarplums around here. Luckily, ’tis the season for sharing, so yesterday my sister and I spent the latter half of the day in the kitchen icing and decorating cookies for our annual rounds through the neighborhood. With no more than a sugar cookie base, some blue-tinted glaze and a container of edible pearls, we treated our neighbors to golden boxes of pretty, sweet snowflakes — our best attempt at a white Christmas, even if the forecast calls for sun.

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Snowflake Sugar Cookies
For the cookies (recipe adapted from Real Simple):
• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 3 teaspoons vanilla

In a medium-sized bowl, mix flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside.

Using electric mixer, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Add egg, and cream until fluffy (takes about two minutes). Add vanilla, and mix until combined. Turn mixer on low speed, gradually add dry ingredients, and mix until fully incorporated.

Form dough into disk shape, wrap with plastic wrap or parchment paper, and refrigerate for at least one hour.

Roll out dough on floured surface until it’s about 1/4 inch thick. Cut out snowflake cookie shapes, and place about an inch apart on a parchment-lined baking sheet.

Bake at 350 degrees for 12 to 15 minutes (or until edges turn golden brown).

For the glaze:
• 2 cups confectioners’ sugar
• 2 to 3 tablespoons water
• blue icing gel or food coloring
• edible pearl candies

Place confectioners’ sugar and water in a medium bowl, and mix until smooth. For a thicker glaze, add a bit more sugar; for a thinner glaze, add a bit more water. To tint the glaze blue, add a teeny dot of blue icing gel or food coloring, and mix until fully incorporated. For deeper color, add a dot more blue.

Dip the tops of cooled cookies in the glaze, and place on a cooling rack to dry so excess icing doesn’t pool around the bottom of the cookies. Before icing hardens, dot the center and each end with a pearl candy. Let cookies sit for 30 minutes to an hour (until the icing dries) before serving or stacking.

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I’m sure a parade of cookies will continue passing through our kitchen in the next few days, but these snowflake guys are certainly contenders for Mr. Claus’ visit. What sweets will you leave for Santa this year? Sugar cookies? Gingerbread? Loads of cheese? (According to TV, that’s really the way to bring in the loot.) Just don’t forget: When you give a Santa a cookie, he’s going to want a glass of milk. Ho, ho, ho!

Happy Christmas!

XO,
Katrina