| | |

Christmas Sugar Cookies

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tag

This Christmas Sugar Cookie Recipe is perfect for making these fun cookies with royal icing for Christmas! Grab the free printable tag below to make a darling gift this year.

These classic sugar cookies are fun to make to celebrate Christmas at your next event or party! I’m a huge fan of creating treats for every occasion, especially delicious ones like these.

Too busy to make this right away? Pin it for later! Pin this easy recipe to your favorite board on Pinterest and it will be waiting there when you’re ready.

Sugar cookie dough is super versatile and easy to make with only a few ingredients from the grocery store. You will need simple ingredients like butter, granulated sugar and all purpose flour.

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

How darling is this snowman cookie though?! He totally reminds me of Olaf!

Be sure to set aside enough time to decorate the cookies, you may even want to spread it out over a few days. When adding details it’s important to wait until the layer of flooded icing is completely dry otherwise the icing may crack and the colors will bleed.

Before you get started make sure that you have everything that you need to make and decorate these cookies. I found our cookie cutters and icing bottles at Michaels but you can also order them from Amazon below.

This post contains affiliate links.

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

This is my grandma’s classic sugar cookie recipe – time tested and delicious. The only thing that I have changed over the years is swapped out shortening for butter.

Ingredients:

  • 1 cup white sugar
  • 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
  • 1 large egg
  • 4 Tbsp milk
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/4 tsp salt

Tip: Pre-made Pillsbury refrigerated sugar cookie dough can be used to create these cookies as well. Simply add 1/4 cup of flour to the dough, combine well and roll as directed. I love quick mom hacks like this!

Valentine Sugar Cookie Bar Process

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

sugar cookie process

2. In a large bowl with an electric mixer or stand mixer with paddle attachment, combine dry ingredients. Add butter, egg, milk and extract. Mix on medium speed until a soft dough forms.

sugar cookie process

3. Chill the dough in the refrigerator for at least one hour. This helps to prevent the dough from spreading when baked.

sugar cookie process

4. Dust your surface with flour and use a rolling pin to roll the dough to 1/4″ thickness on the floured surface.

5. Use cookie cutters to cut shapes from the dough. Place the cookies on the prepared baking sheet.

St Patricks Day Sugar Cookies Process

6. Bake until the cookies are lightly brown around the edges, about 7 minutes.

7. Place the cookies on a wire rack to cool.

This recipe will make about 60 rectangular shaped cookies.

Sugar Cookie Process

Use my Easy Royal Icing Recipe to make the best icing for these cookies! You will need light green, red, orange, blue, brown, black and white royal icing that has been tinted with food coloring.

I prefer to use icing bottles over a piping bag because I find them easier to handle. Here I have our different colors of icing ready in each bottle.

Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

My royal icing tips:

  • If the icing is too hard, add more water one drop at a time.
  • If the icing is too soft, add more powdered sugar one teaspoon at a time.
  • Icing can be stored at room temperature in a an airtight container for up to two weeks.
  • To use, mix the royal icing with a hand mixer so that it becomes smooth and shiny again.
  • Flood consistency is reached when a spoonful dropped onto a flat surface takes 10 – 15 seconds to become completely smooth.
Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

These instructions will show you how to decorate Christmas cookies like these ones. You can really get creative though and have fun with the process! There is no right or wrong way to decorate pretty holiday cookies.

How to decorate Christmas sugar cookies:

Additional supplies: edible candy eyes and mini red m&m. It’s easiest to start icing by color with a large set of decorated cookies like this.

Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

1. Flood two cookies with white icing and one with a squiggle of icing at both ends. Use a scribe to push icing into corners and pop any bubbles as you go.

Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

2. Before the icing dries, add stripes of red and green to one of the white cookies. This is called wet on wet icing.

Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

3. Use the scribe to pull through the stripes of icing on the cookie to create a zig zag pattern. Create two green triangle shapes on another cookie.

Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

4. Before the green icing dries, add dots of white icing to create polka dots.

Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

5. Flood a cookie with brown icing and another with red icing. Add polka dots to the red icing before it dries.

Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

6. Add a blue scarf and orange nose to the white cookie.

Christmas Sugar Cookie Process

7. Fill in the white squiggles with red icing. Add candy eyes to the snowman and reindeer cookie. Add another green triangle and polka dots to the tree cookie.

8. When the icing dries finish off the reindeer by piping on brown antlers. Finish the tree with a brown trunk and add a black belt to the santa cookie. Finish the snowman with a black food writer smile.

These Christmas cookies turned out to be simply darling! Far easier to create than you would think, all you need is a little patience and practise. These easy holiday sugar cookies make a delicious treat!

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

Sugar Cookie Reindeer

Allow the icing to completely harden for at least four hours before packaging or storing the cookies. These look amazing wrapped in cellophane or packed up in a cookie box.

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

Sugar Cookie Christmas Tree

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

Sugar Cookie Snowman

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

Add my free printable gift tag and voila! A darling gift to brighten any day!!

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

Be sure to check out all of my sugar cookie decorating for tons of ideas and hours of fun!!

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

This post contains affiliate links.

Some of my baking essentials:

Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

Enter your name and email below to get an instant download of the files! You are then registered for my weekly email Newsletter that is full of fun recipes, easy crafts and free printables.

File usage

  • All digital files on Homemade Heather are for personal use only.
  • Please direct others to the original website link when sharing.
  • Digital reselling, resharing or distribution is prohibited and NOT allowed.
Christmas Sugar Cookies with Printable Gift Tags

If you love this Christmas Sugar Cookie Recipe, please give it a five star review and help me share it on Facebook or Pinterest so that others can enjoy it too!

Christmas Sugar Cookies

Christmas Sugar Cookies

Yield: 60
Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cook Time: 7 minutes
Additional Time: 2 hours
Total Time: 2 hours 27 minutes

This Christmas Sugar Cookie Recipe is perfect for making these fun cookies with royal icing for Christmas! Grab the free printable tag below to make a darling gift this year.

Ingredients

  • 1 cup white sugar
  • 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
  • 1 large egg
  • 4 Tbsp milk
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/4 tsp salt

Instructions

1. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.

2. In a large bowl with electric mixer or stand mixer with paddle attachment, combine dry ingredients. Add butter, egg, milk and extract. Mix on medium speed until a soft dough forms.

3. Chill the dough in the refrigerator for at least one hour. This helps to prevent the dough from spreading when baked.

4. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

5. Dust your surface with flour and use a rolling pin to roll the dough to 1/4" thickness.

6. Use cookie cutters to cut shapes from the dough. Place the cookies on the prepared cookie sheet.

7. Bake until the cookies are lightly brown around the edges, about 7 minutes.

8. Place the cookies on a wire rack to cool before decorating with royal icing.

Notes

Follow the step by step instructions in the blog post to decorate each cookie.

Nutrition Information:
Yield: 60 Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 44Total Fat: 2gSaturated Fat: 1gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 1gCholesterol: 7mgSodium: 45mgCarbohydrates: 7gFiber: 0gSugar: 3gProtein: 1g

All values are approximate and based on ingredients used by the recipe writer. Always calculate your own individual nutritional values for the most accurate calculation.

Did you make this recipe?

Please leave a comment on the blog or share a photo on Pinterest

about heather

Hello, I’m Heather!

I'm an active mom of twin boys who is always looking for opportunities to inspire creativity through fun crafts, do-it-yourself projects and delicious recipes. This blog has been an integral part of supporting my little family and I am so grateful to have you become a part of our journey! Let's create together... Read more...

Subscribe
Notify of

0 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments