Decorated Nutcracker Cookies
I couldn’t resist; a few weeks ago I put up a Christmas tree (yes, I know, ahem, a few weeks ago), with some of these nutcracker ornaments.
This little guy got me thinking about nutcracker cookies.
Or cookie I should say. I only ended up making the one… He took a little longer than usual to finish. This pic shows the beginning stages of decoration.
Since I’m not very skilled at drawing (or adept at chosing the right side of the cookie apparently), I used an image of Christmas stickers with my KopyKake projector. First piped the dark outlines, then flooded the first layer. After that dried I added more layers of detail.
I’m thinking I’d like to try another one with him {below} as the inspiration:
Gingerbread has never been my favorite cookie, but I do like the taste of the recipe I use from my sister-in-law. It had a bit of a ‘bite’ to it originally (spicy), so I’ve changed it a bit over the years to make it a little more neutral. (Especially for kids!) If you like a bit more of a ‘kick’, add one teaspoon more of the ginger, cinammon and cloves and one teaspoon of pepper.
It’s a great recipe for gingerbread houses as well. If you’d like to try it out, check out the recipe below.
For the royal icing recipe, click here.
*
Gingerbread Cookie Recipe
For the printer-friendly version, click here.
Ingredients:
800 g all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
250 g unsalted butter
1 cup packed dark-brown sugar
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoons ground cloves
1 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
1 cup molasses
*
Instructions:
1. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix butter and brown sugar on medium speed until fluffy.
2. Mix in spices first, then eggs and molasses. Reduce speed to low.
3. Sift together flour, salt and baking powder and add to bowl; mix until just combined.
4. Wrap dough in a disc shape in saran wrap. Let it rest by refrigerating until cold, about 1 hour.
5. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Roll out dough on a lightly floured work surface or between two sheets of parchment paper to about 1/4-inch thick.
6. Cut shapes out with cookie cutters and place them approximately 2 inches apart on baking sheets lined with parchment paper.
7. Refrigerate until firm; at least 15 minutes to 1 hour.
8. Bake cookies until lightly golden; 12 to 14 minutes. Let cool on sheets on wire racks.
*
Happy baking!
xo,
Marian
Thanks, Marian. I think I’m going to attempt to make some cookie cutters this year.
How do you get your red so bright and vivid? What food color paste do you use?
Americolor- and lots of it!
@ marian:
Ms. Marian
Does it alter the taste of the icing? I found that when I used a lot of the americolor Christmas Red, it tasted a little off.
I use LOTS of Wilton Red (No Taste). There’s no taste at all and I get a REALLY bright red.
Tania, Yes, I does taste a little off to me too. =(
Could you please tell me where you got your nutcracker cookie cutter? I haven’t been able to find this one. Thank you. Paula
pstebbins@indy.rr.com
HI Paula, I found an image of a nutcracker on the net, used it to cut a template out for the nutcracker and then used a pizza wheel and sharp knife to manually cut him out. It was a lot slower than a cookie cutter! lol.
I just came across your website and am looking forward to trying this recipe. I have stayed away from any cookie that uses a cookie cutter to cut out. Too time consuming. Hearing about freezing is a new concept to me.
How long would you bake the cookies frozen dough and at what temp?
Thanks!
@ Camille: There’s a post dedicated to freezing cookies; if you’d like to check it out it’s under tutorials and is called, ‘Freezing Decorated Cookies’. You’ll find much more detail there than I could provide in my answer here. =)
Hi Marion…. Have you considered making a haunted gingerbread house? I would love to see what your designed would be. I make them every year and host a haunted house making party with friends…. they are so cute and get excited about what candy they can collect! Here’s a pic of mine that was posted by someone: http://www.gingerbread-house-heaven.com/haunted-mansion.html
Hope to see one soon! Your work is so inspirational! How do you stay so slim with all that sugar around?
@ Mary-Clare: So gorgeous! A genuine work of art. I could never eat that house.
I have made a halloween gingerbread house, but it was just the front (a facade); a project from Teresa Layman’s book.
It’s in the gingerbread category if you’d like to see it. Yours was def. more detailed!
Thanks for the compliments… her hee. It’s an on-going thing… but lately I’ve been trying to give everything away and jog more. lol
How much cups of butter and flour? I tried searching for the conversion for grams to cups I am finding different answers on different sites.
I love, love, love your site! You inspired me to start making my own decorated cookies – and it’s official – I sold my cookies to a local market today! Thanks for the inspiration (and motivation). Jill
How much flour and butter? Do not have a scale.
Thanks,Mel
Which copy kake do you like?
@ Melody: I”ll have to measure with cups the next time I make it, sorry I don’t have your answer now. Google will have conversions for you.
Check out my kopykake tutorial in the tutorial section; i compare the models at the bottom of the tutorial
xo
@ Jilly_Bean:
Is this Jilly Bean from Lynnfield by any chance??
I know it depends on the size of the cookie… but lets say its a 3 inch circle, how many cookies would you get out of this recipe?
I teach a baking class to little girls and would like to make ginger bread houses with them so I need to figure out how many batches of this dough I need to crank out!
@ Erica: Oh, sounds like fun! I’m in the same boat as you Erica, I would need to actually make the recipe once and see how many 3 inch circles it makes, and then do my calculations.
Hi Marian,
Your nutcracker gingerbread is beyond gorgeous. I seriously don’t know how you do what you do. I just have one quick question about the recipe itself: I read in one of your posts that you don’t use baking powder anymore in your sugar cookie recipe. Do you also omit it from your gingerbread recipe? Thanks in advance for your help!
@ Nadine: Sweet thanks for your kind comments! I DO omit it from my gingerbread now too. I kind of slowly morphed to doing that… just makes things easier in terms of getting the shapes I want.
Have fun decorating Nadine!
You’re the best, Marian. Thanks!
@ Jilly_Bean and Melody, I just made the gingerbread dough. I still don’t know how many the batch makes because it is still parked in my fridge, but I weighed AND measured out the flour as I went along and it was just under 6 cups of sifted A.P. flour. The butter is 2 sticks and 1 TBS. It makes a pretty decent size amount of dough for which I am grateful!
Thanks again Marion.
@ Erica: Thanks so much! I will direct people to your comment when they ask. xo
What are molasses? The only things I can find in the UK shops are Natural Molasses Sugar or Treacle. Also do you have the metric weight for the molasses?
@ Conny: That’s right! Treacle is molasses (just another name).
Sorry, I don’t have the metric weight for the treacle.
Is this dough quite moist or easy to roll and cut?
@ Conny: This one is not as moist as my sugar cookie recipe, so is easier to roll and cut. I do roll mine between sheets of parchment and chill before cutting. Happy baking and please don’t hesitate to visit if you have any more questions!
Hello, I’m from Chile and I congratulate you for the wonderful art you do! My question is this …. I can replace the molasses with honey bee?.
Greetings from Chile
Merry Christmas
marian wrote:
Thanks. I have attempted these tonight using a conversion from cup to grams for treacle, but my cookies are quite a bit darker looking than yours, so maybe I have used a bit too much. Is there any chance at all you could measure the treacle next time you make this recipe if you have some scales?
@ Conny:
Will do.
Another factor is the brown sugar. Try a lighter brown sugar next time.
I too cannot find the answers for conversions I’m in bc Canada and we use the ounces and cups more so than the grams and such must be a west coast thing lol
so what I ended up doing was converting grams to ounces and than ounces to ml because that’s what my butter is in and its all weight to weight as apposed to weight to volume. One cup of butter weighs 8 ounces 250grams is 8.8 ounces and 260.54 ml on my butter it says 250 ml is one cup so im going with that lol so to break it down i did grams to ounces to ml
than i realised i was crazy for even going to ounces first haha and went straight from grams to ml
scratch that i know why i did that holy sorry for the spam lol
Can you please convert recipe from metric to english? I am totally in love with your website!
@ Arrie: Ha ha! The next time I make it I’ll use cups etc. and write it down.
This looks great! I have a batch in the fridge right now waiting to be made into gingerbread houses. For those needing conversions:
-the flour is ABOUT 6 cups, I would go with 5 1/2 and if you need more at the end you can add it.
-the butter is (as mentioned above) 2 sticks and 1Tbsp.
-I had no molasses, and substituted 3/4 cup brown sugar for the molasses.
-I also had no cloves, and substituted allspice for the cloves.
So far, the dough tastes AWESOME, and I don’t usually Luke gingerbread dough! I will post more info after I’ve got mine cut out and baked, I’m excited!
Thanks @ Kathryn! I’ve been meaning to do that for so long, but always forget!
Merry Christmas to you!
800 grams is equal to 1 lb 12.22 oz. WEIGHED. 250 grams is equal to 8.86 ounces WEIGHED.
@ Kathryn: You may like the dough because it doesn’t have the molasses! That is what makes the distinct flavor, I have to know, did it hold together well?
@ Paula: You asked about the Molasses, if it’s because you can’t find it in Chile it’s probably called melaza there. Also, you may have brown sugar but when we lived in Peru they had something called “azúcar morena” but it wasn’t the same as what is considered brown sugar in the states. It’s what we call “sugar in the raw” here. To make brown sugar you mix azúcar and melaza and that makes the equivalent to what we have in the states. If you already knew that great! I just remember not having brown sugar available and having to learn to make my own.