Magical Sparkling Snowflakes Christmas Butter Biscuits Cookies Recipes

MAGICAL SPARKLING SNOWFLAKES: CHRISTMAS BUTTER BISCUITS-COOKIES

Steps:

• Place flour and the icing sugar in a food processor. Process for 30 seconds. Add butter. Process until mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add egg and vanilla. Process until dough comes together. If it is too dry, add some milk.
• Transfer to a lightly floured surface. Knead dough until smooth. Press or roll into a 9"/20cm circle. Wrap in greaseproof paper. Refrigerate for 1 hour or until firm.
• Preheat oven to 180C/360F, and line 2 flat baking/cookie trays with baking paper. Roll out dough between 2 sheets of baking paper until about 1/4"/5mm thick.
• Using snowflake biscuit/cookie cutters, cut shapes out of dough. Place on them gently on to the trays. Press leftover dough together and repeat cutting out shapes. Refrigerate for 30 minutes or until firm.
• Bake the cookies/biscuits for 10 minutes, swapping trays after 5 minutes, or until light golden in colour. Allow to cool on trays completely.
• Pipe trellis-work patterns following the snowflake shapes, or drizzle glace icing over the top; then dust them with edible glitter/edible silver dusting powder whilst the icing is still wet.
• Dust with remaining sugar or edible glitter/silver dust just before serving.
• Note for making holes for hanging on the Christmas Tree: Just before baking, take a plastic drinking straw and press into the top of the snowflake shapes - to make a small hole - then gently wiggle the straw around a bit to widen the hole, and bake as before. On taking them out of the oven, if the holes have closed up a bit, gently wiggle around again with a plastic drinking straw, to make the holes bigger! Excuse the language, I don't know how else to put it! LOL!

SNOWFLAKE COOKIES

Steps:

• In large bowl, mix granulated sugar, butter, vanilla and eggs until well blended. Stir in flour, baking powder and salt. Cover and refrigerate at least 1 hour but no longer than 24 hours.
• Heat oven to 400°F. On lightly floured surface, roll about one-third of dough 1/8 inch thick. Cut with 1 1/2 to 2-inch star-shaped cookie cutter. Place 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet.
• Bake about 6 minutes or until light brown. Remove from cookie sheet to cooling rack. Cool completely, about 30 minutes. Repeat with remaining dough.
• In medium bowl, mix all glaze ingredients except coarse sugar crystals until smooth, glossy and pourable. Place cooled cookies together in pairs with about 1 teaspoon glaze, with points of top cookie between points of bottom cookie. Place cookies on cooling rack on cookie sheet to catch excess glaze. Pour 1 tablespoon glaze evenly over top and sides of each cookie, glazing only a few at time. When glaze is set but still soft, move cookies to another rack or waxed paper; sprinkle with sugar crystals. (Occasionally remove glaze from cookie sheet, and add a few drops of hot water as necessary to make glaze smooth and thin enough to pour; continue glazing.)
• In small bowl, mix frosting ingredients to make a frosting that can be easily drizzled or used in a decorating bag, yet holds its shape. Pipe snowflake designs on cookies. Let cookies dry completely before storing.

BUTTER SNOW FLAKES

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Sift together the flour, salt, and cinnamon; set aside.
• In a medium bowl, cream together butter and cream cheese. Add sugar and egg yolk; beat until light and fluffy. Stir in the vanilla and orange zest. Gradually blend in the dry ingredients. Fill a cookie press or pastry bag with dough, and form cookies on an ungreased cookie sheet.
• Bake for 12 to 15 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the cookies are golden brown on the peaks and on the bottoms. Remove from cookie sheets at once to cool on wire racks.

CHRISTMAS BUTTER COOKIE CUTOUTS

Steps:

• In large bowl, beat butter and granulated sugar with electric mixer on medium speed until creamy. On low speed, beat in egg, lemon peel and 2 tablespoons lemon juice. Stir in flour, baking soda and salt until well blended.
• Divide dough into 4 parts; flatten each part into 1/2-inch-thick round. Wrap each in waxed paper or plastic wrap; refrigerate 30 minutes.
• Heat oven to 350°F. Remove 1 round of dough at a time from refrigerator. Between sheets of floured waxed paper or plastic wrap, roll dough until 1/4 to 3/8 inch thick. Cut with 3-inch cookie cutters in various shapes. On ungreased cookie sheets, place cutouts 1 inch apart.
• Bake 10 to 12 minutes or just until edges are golden. Cool on cookie sheets about 1 minute before removing to cooling rack. To make cookies for hanging, using a toothpick or end of plastic straw, carefully poke a hole in the top of each cookie while cookies are still hot. Cool 10 to 15 minutes before frosting.
• In medium bowl, stir together powdered sugar and meringue powder. Stir in 5 teaspoons lemon juice and enough of the 4 to 5 tablespoons water to make a thin icing. Transfer 1/2 cup of the icing into small bowl; set aside. Using a flexible pastry brush, paint cookies to the edges with icing. Place on cooling rack to dry completely, about 30 minutes.
• Beat reserved icing with electric mixer on high speed 5 to 7 minutes or until peaks form. Place in small resealable food-storage plastic bag; cut a very small hole in the bottom of the bag with the plain white icing. Squeeze icing onto glazed cookies. Before icing dries, sprinkle with decorations, and tap off excess. Dry thoroughly on cooling rack. Thread cookies with narrow ribbon for hanging.

SPARKLING VANILLA CHRISTMAS COOKIES

Steps:

• Tip the icing sugar, vanilla extract, egg yolk and butter into a mixing bowl, then stir together with a wooden spoon (or pulse in a food processor until well combined). Add the flour and mix to a firm dough. Shape the dough into two flat discs and wrap them. Chill for 20-30 mins. Heat oven to 190C/fan 170C/gas 5 and line two baking sheets with non-stick baking paper.
• Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface to about the thickness of two £1 coins. Cut out Christmassy shapes (use a cutter if you like) and place on the baking sheets. Using the tip of a skewer, cut a small hole in the top of each cookie. Bake for 10-12 mins until lightly golden.
• Lift the biscuits onto a wire rack to cool. Meanwhile, mix the icing sugar with a few drops of cold water to make a thick, but still runny icing. Colour with edible food colouring, if you like. Spread it over the cooled biscuits, decorate with edible balls and thread with ribbon when dry.

DELICATE ICING SNOWFLAKES

Steps:

• Beat powdered sugar, meringue powder and water in large bowl with electric mixer on low speed until sugar is moistened. Beat on high speed 5 to 7 minutes or until very glossy and stiff peaks form.
• Place icing in decorating bag with #10 tip. Or place icing in strong plastic bag; cut off a tip from one corner of bag. Keep damp paper towel over tip when not in use to prevent icing from hardening.
• Cover cookie sheet with waxed paper or cooking parchment paper. Enlarge or reduce patterns (use your browser's search to find and print snowflake patterns); slide patterns under waxed paper. Trace patterns by piping on frosting, tracing longest lines of pattern first. Use a small paintbrush dipped into water to smooth any irregularities, working on each snowflake as it is piped. For candles, draw snowflakes freehand or use toothpick or pin to etch design before piping icing.
• Lightly brush entire snowflake with water; immediately sprinkle with glitter (use only edible glitter or sugar if snowflakes are to be eaten). Let dry; remove from waxed paper. To hang as decorations, attach nylon thread to one end.