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Hall Cook Book

Christmas Cookies

Category: Cookies / Submtd By: Peggy Hall

Yield: 48 Cookies

Juliet and masha gave me a set of nine 1" tall christmas cookie cutters one year. I created these cookies to make use of the cookie cutters and highlight my home made jelly. They were such a big hit with the family that i started serving them for christmas eve every year after that. This recipe makes 2 types of cookies; stained glass sandwich cookies and your standard decorated sugar cookie. -peggy.

2 Tubes Pillsbury Sugar Cookie	2 Teaspoons Almond Extract
-Dough, 18 Ounces Each	8 Ounce Jar Seedless Raspberry
Flour	-Jelly
3 Cups Powdered Sugar, Sifted	Candy Sprinkles
3 Ounces Cream Cheese

Equipment:
Baking Parchment Paper
1.5 inch Assorted Christmas Cookie Cutters
3 inch Round Cookie Cutter
Wax Paper

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Roll out the cookie dough and cut out as many round cookies as you can.
Half of the round cookies will serve as sandwich bottoms and half as tops.
Cut out Christmas cookie shapes from the center of the cookie rounds that will act as the sandwich tops.
Cut out Christmas cookie shapes from any dough left after cutting out the cookie rounds.

The sugar cookie dough is very sticky and rather difficult to work with.
Following are some helpful suggestions:
- Cut the cookie dough tubes in half to start out with.
- Keep the cookie dough in plastic wrap in the refrigerator until you are ready to work with it.
- Use just enough flour to prevent the cookie dough from sticking to the rolling pin when you roll out the cookies.
- Roll out the cookie dough 1/4 inch thick onto baking parchment paper.
- Place the parchment paper in the freezer for about 5 minutes to harden cookie dough before using cookie cutters.
- If the dough begins to soften up, return to freezer until hard again.
- If the Christmas cookie cutout does not come up with the cookie cutter, use a sharp knife to pry it up.
- If the Christmas cookie cutout comes up cleanly from the cookie round, then place the Christmas cookie on baking parchment.
- If the Christmas cookie cutout does not come up cleanly, add it to the dough that will be rolled out in the next round of baking.

Bake the cookies for 7-9 minutes or until edges are lightly browned.

Leave the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for a couple of minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
When cookies are cool, set neatly aside in a large tupperware or on a plate.

When ready to assemble, lay out a large sheet of wax paper on the counter.
Place all cookie rounds without a cutout on the wax paper, flat side up.
Place the cream cheese in a medium sized mixing bowl and microwave on high for 30 minutes to soften.
Sift 1 cup of the powdered sugar in with the cream cheese and mix until smooth.
Add 1 teaspoon almond extract and mix until incorporated.
Sift in another cup of powdered sugar and mix until smooth.
Take each of the cookie rounds from the waxed paper, spread with cream cheese filling, and return to the waxed paper.

Place the Jelly in a small saucepan on low heat. For the cookies shown in the picture, I used a home made blackberry jelly.
Let cook for about 20 minutes. When the jelly thickly coats a spoon it is done.
The point is to remove enough water from the jelly so it won't run off the cookie.
Take the jelly off the heat and allow to cool for a few minutes.
Drop a scant tablespoon of hot jelly on top of the cream cheese cookie filling.
Place a cookie with a Christmas cutout on top of the jelly, making a cookie sandwich.
Allow to cool.
Layer cookies in a tin or tupperware, keeping each layer separated by a piece of wax paper.
Makes approximately 20 cookie sandwiches.

Place the Christmas cutout cookies on the wax paper.
In a medium bowl, mix 1 cup sifted powdered sugar, 1 teaspoon almond extract, and 4 tablespoons of water.
Blend until smooth. Heat in the microwave for 30 seconds on high.
Drop a bit of icing on each Christmas cutout cookie and sprinkle with candy sprinkles.
Allow the icing to dry.

Makes approximately 30 miniature Christmas cookies.

Submitted by Peggy Hall.

Per Cookie: 123 Cal (30% from Fat, 3% from Protein, 67% from Carb); 1 g Protein; 4 g Tot Fat; 1 g Sat Fat; 2 g Mono Fat; 21 g Carb; 0 g Fiber; 16 mg Calcium; 0 mg Iron; 78 mg Sodium; 7 mg Cholesterol

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