It’s kind of surreal to me that I’ve been blogging long enough to have a ‘top 5 Christmas cookie recipe list’, but I do! The cookies that get the most traffic during the holidays – ‘traffic’ is blogger-speak for views. People surf the internet looking for cookie recipes, find my site, and look around. I have a function on my blog that tells me what posts get the most action. Because I’ve been sharing recipes for the last three Christmases, I’ve pretty much emptied my own recipe box. Like most families, we have our traditional favourites. If I baked up some new cookie recipes, I’d have a table full of grumpy faces staring back at me! Although, I do have a funny story to tell you about just that…
Every year, I bake for Christmas, until I fill my freezer. Fruit pies, tea breads, classic Christmas cakes, shortbread, sugar cookies and gingerbread men. All of the goodies stay locked in the freezer until Christmas eve. Our tradition on Christmas Eve, after mass, is to eat lobster [ keep in mind I live on the Bay of Fundy – lobster was 5 bucks a pound last year ] followed by everyone’s favourite Christmas cookies. Normally, I’m too full for dessert but, a couple of years ago, I grabbed one of my ‘famous’ gingerbread men. I’d watched my family eat them for years but I’d never tasted them. FULL DISCLOSURE: I NEVER TASTE ANYTHING WHILE I’M COOKING – DON’T JUDGE ME.
We were all sitting around the dining room table, laughing and telling stories as I bit the foot off of my gingerbread man. I don’t think that I hit the wall, opposite me, when I spit it out…
“These gingerbread men are disgusting”, I choked!
In unison, with big grins on all of their faces my family said, “we know”.
For twenty-seven years, I’d baked the nastiest tasting gingerbread men on the planet and my kids ate them. Rather than risk hurting my feelings, they explained that they’d eat the gingerbread men first to get rid of them. They, then, moved on to the cookies they liked. I think I’m safe to say, I have the sweetest daughters.
Here are the links to my taste tested top 5 Christmas cookie recipes:
- Sugar Cookies
- Salted Caramel and Chocolate Shortbread Bites
- Rugelach
- Chocolate Raspberry Buttercreams
- Cranberry Pistachio Fennel Cantucci
Thanks for reading.
Photography by Michelle Hooton.
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