The rolling pin is back at the rear of the cabinet, the cookie sheets are in their designated space, and the recipes have been returned to their box. Cookie season is officially over.
Recently, I was tasked to make Christmas cookies for a group I belong to. Now I can find my way around the kitchen pretty easily so it wasn’t a chore and there is barely a cookie I don’t love except snickerdoodles—a hard pass for me, but it made me wonder.
Do people still make Christmas cookies? Have healthier eating habits, a decrease in social connections for many people, and a lack of family nearby stifled this tradition? So, I posed the question to my Facebook friends. Do you still make Christmas cookies from scratch?
A resounding YES!
One friend said “Guilty.” Someone asked “Who doesn’t?” Numerous folks screamed “ME” You’d think I had asked “Who wants Arizona weather this holiday season?” That should also be a yes. Even my friend who describes her aqua KitchenAid mixer as kitchen jewelry makes Christmas cookies. By the way, I think that’s one of the best descriptions I’ve ever heard.
When I finished my fifth batch of cookies, I realized there are really Five Rules for Making Christmas Cookies.
- They have to be made from scratch. None of this dough in a roll that you slice and bake. Nope. Not at Christmas.
- You must use a family recipe. Bonus if it’s covered with smudged fingerprints.
- A mess is required. Every inch of counter space and intrusion onto kitchen and dining room tables is allowed. Sadly, there are no elves to clean up.
- You must share more that you keep for yourself. I know. That’s tough.
- A lump in the throat and a tear in the eye is part of the experience. From your own memories or for the memories you are creating.
Making and receiving cookies are a tradition that has stood the test of time since the middle-ages. We bake to share a plate of joy with a neighbor, co-workers, or the mailman. We bake to fill the kitchen with smells of years gone by. We bake to honor our mothers and grandmothers whose recipes we’ve inherited.
Forget the fat and sugar in each tasty morsel, and relish the calm and peace that comes out of the oven with each sheet of cookies. And think of the kindness you’ll be sharing.
Do you have a favorite cookie you like to make at the holidays? Does it have any family history?
I love this (and thanks for the kitchen jewelry compliment)! My only rule with Xmas cookies is that I call BOGUS COOKIE if you try to pass off cookies you can make any time of year as Xmas Cookies. You cannot claim chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin or peanut butter as special. Well, maybe if you stick a Hershey Kiss on top of a little peanut butter cookie. But that’s IT. My favorite is the iced cutout sugar cookie that you and Kathy gamely attacked. That’s WORK, man. That’s Xmas dedication. Kudos. But one of my favorites, and a long tradition in my partly-Italian family, are pizzelle waffle cookies. Now, I think using the traditional anise flavoring is the only way to go, but my grandmother didn’t care for anise so she’d make vanilla (yawn), lemon (meh) and chocolate (barely acceptable). I’m mentioning this in case anyone hates anise or licorice. There are options. Lesser options, IMO. but options, nevertheless. The recipe I use yields about six dozen cookies which means spending a LONG time pressing and timing each pair (must have an iron that makes two at a time). You go from cooking, putting the hot waffles on a rack to cool, press the next two, move two cooled cookies from the rack to a plate, freeing up rack space, repeat. Not a task for sissies, calling for concentration and split second timing.. And here’s a tip if you want to keep them fresh and crispy: wrap small stacks in foil, or keep them in an airtight tin. Plastic bags make them soft. No one wants a limp pizzelle, amiright? So there you go. Thank you for asking and now that I’ve written so much, I don’t feel remotely inspired to write on my own blog. Happy holidays, chicas!
My favorites are black and white snowballs with lots of nuts. Some call them wedding cookies.
My mom sent Christmas cookies to me at Christmas time when I was in the Air Force stationed in Turkey and West Berlin in the 1970s. For some weird rationale, getting married meant you had to make your own.
Today, I’ve been told my several folks that a mailing cookies results in crumbs. I loved getting the decorated cookies with a limb missing or the candy canes with the cinnamon morsel dried off and upturning the box and eating the crumbs with a spoon I’m married still but don’t have a kitchen and still no handmade cookies again this year.
Always fun to read your thoughts.
I love Christmas cookies but NEVER make cutouts. Just a good shortbread for me. And of course, Christmas crack.
Loved reading your take on Christmas Cookies – spot on! Totally agree that the recipe card must have smudges from many past uses!
Gingersnaps for me. I only make them at Christmas, and they are the only kind I make. We love them at our house, but a few of the other places I go we have cookie exchanges, so I give away some snaps and come home with other kinds. The best is the church exchange. This year we had 20 different bakers. The rule is if you bring 2 doz. cookies you can pick out 2 doz. of the others. That’s enough for our 2 person household.
What a great tradition and I also like those exchanges. And gingersnaps – a favorite of mine as well. Thanks for sharing and I’m sorry it took me so long to reply. Opps!
Thumbprint and butterballs now, but used to make about 7 or 8 different ones each year. 140 or so dozen to give away as gifts. Lots of work and I don’t have the energy or desire anymore. Yours looked beautiful!
Thank you, Marge, It’s part of Christmas for me, to be honest, but I’ve never made the amount you did. I sure lost track of this post – sorry about that.
A resounding YES to Christmas cookies — our family traditional Christmas cookie takes days to make but OMGoodness! We make Tennessee Whiskey Fruit Cake cookies!
Oh my goodness, those must be some extra good cookies. Thanks, Susan, for sharing. Sorry I fell so behind in responding.
My family loves my sugar cookies. They’re really nothing special but they love them. My 25 year old nephew has made a point to come help me make cookies every Christmas for the past 6 years. What makes that extra special is that he is only home for 3 days at Christmas because of his work schedule, but always carves out the time to come over. He loves to help with the entire process. This year I gave him the Betty Crocker cooky cookbook that contains the recipe, a rolling pin and a cookie cutter. Not his favorite gift I’m sure for someone his age. I did include a card that told him how special this tradition was to me and now when I’m gone he can carry on. These cookies feed my soul in more ways than one.
This is so special. Thanks for sharing and so sorry, I didn’t see this earlier.
I make biscotti every year and Florentine’s. Then orange sugar cookies dipped in chocolate called black and whites , always given as gifts with some left over for my hubby .
Thos all sound delicious. How do I get to be one of your gift-recieving friends? Appreciate you taking the time to read this oldie and respond.