Celebrating Holiday Cookies with Dan Pelosi

Episode Transcript

Jessica: This season is brought to you by Plugra premium European style butter, made using a slow churn process. 

David: Look for Plugra wherever fine butters are sold 

Sable. Exactly. I just wanted to see if I could pronounce that word right.  

Jessica: From King Arthur Baking Company, this is Things Bakers Know. I'm Jessica Battilana, King Arthur Staff Editor.  

David: And I'm David Tamarkin, Editorial Director at King Arthur Baking, and today we're talking all about holiday cookies. 

Jessica: Uh, finally, I've been waiting for this episode. I think since we started doing this podcast, it wasn't, yeah, timing wise, appropriate to do it in our first season, although sure, you could talk about holiday cookies in April. In fact, we have basically been talking about holiday cookies since April.  

David: Perks of working in food media is that you get to talk about the holidays almost all year long. 

We start planning holiday cookies and holiday coverage well before the holidays actually come. And in the case of holiday cookies, I don't mind. 

Jessica: We'll get into what is a holiday cookie in this episode, but I never mind eating a cookie. Our test kitchen is always thinking about new things for the holiday season ahead, but that probably started in June, which is great for me because I, as you know, David host a holiday cookie party at my house every year. 

This is a tradition that came about because I love eating a wide variety of holiday cookies and I always have new recipes I wanna try, and so I was like, I need more people to eat. All the cookies I wanna make. And it has become a really beloved tradition in our household. Our kids really love it. They invite their friends. Now I still make all the cookies because — 

David: Which I can't believe you do that. I'm impressed. And it's very in keeping with who you are. And I love you. So that's, I love who you are and I love that you do this, but I do think it's just wild. How many cookies do you make every year? 

Jessica: Well, usually I make 10 to 12 different varieties of cookies, and it's a lot because they need to all be ready on the same day. So making 10 to 12 batches of cookies over the course of the holidays like that, still extreme, but not as extreme as needing to have them all ready on the same day. So it becomes like, you know, an exercise in timing and freezing and spreadsheets. Doesn't that sound like good holiday fun?  

David: Spreadsheets. Wow.  

Jessica: Uh, but I think the point here, for me at least, and part of the reason, I don't know, I mean, why am I so controlling about the party? Well, there's a number of factors at play and you know. Let me lay down on your therapist couch. One of them is that I have a very high bar for holiday cookies. 

I'm gonna sound like a total jerk saying this, but I don't want random cookies in the mix. I think really hard about what cookies should be there and the textures and the flavors. Having this sort of variety.  

David: Variety is critical. That is something that I wanna talk about and I think the world needs to know and think a little bit more about. 

I would go as far to say that it's not the number of cookies on your cookie plate or in your cookie box. It could be just two cookies, but those cookies have to speak to each other. They have to play off each other. Yeah, you have to have variety. Otherwise you're failing at holiday cookies. You failed. 

You and I were just talking about how early in the year we start thinking about holiday cookies and for me it starts January 1st. I collect and hoard cardboard boxes throughout the year, to pack with cookies and send out at the end of the year as my gifts to people. I don't, I don't really buy gifts for people. I make cookies. Those are my gifts. And so, and I mail them. And however many boxes I've collected by the time December 1st rolls around, dictates how many people in my life get cookies. 

Jessica: So I like to make some of the same recipes every year, and then I bring in a new one. Often the new ones I bring in are wew King Arthur recipes. 

Ones that I've either tried in the test kitchen or seen them make and haven't gotten a chance to try yet. That is gonna be true again this year. We have a zillion holiday cookie recipes, which we have collected in a fantastic list on the site, but we have some new ones that I want people to know about because I'm excited to make them. 

David: King Arthur Holiday Cookies 2025, right? Every year we come out with new holiday cookies. There's always a lot of discussion about what is the theme gonna be? What does the world need this year in holiday cookies? What service can we provide? And this year we really thought about exactly what you do every year. 

Making a cookie platter, putting out a selection of cookies and making sure that they all work together from a variety of textures and flavors. So here's the lineup.  

Jessica: Okay. Drum roll.  

David: We've got sparkling pistachio cookies, which are like a crumbly, sort of like a Mexican wedding cookie texture. So you have that tenderness in a crumbly cookie. 

Yeah. It's also really beautiful 'cause it's rolled in sparkling sugar and it's green from the pistachio. Yeah. Gingerbread biscotti, which this is a delicious biscotti. This will be the cookie I send in the mail.  

Jessica: I feel like we're ruining it for all your friends. 

David: Well, they don't listen to this. Anyway. Striped peppermint shortbread cookies. This is another contender I think could be okay in the mail. Maybe not as good as biscotti because they will stale. But shortbread has a longer shelf life among cookies. Mm-hmm. And this has a beautiful red stripe through it. So it's festive. It's got a little peppermint extract in it to give you that holiday. 

Jessica: But those for sure, you should not, if you decide to ship those, like do not put anything else in the box unless you want it to taste like those peppermint cookies.  

David: You're right. You gotta be careful. Otherwise, your gingerbread biscotti is gonna taste like toothpaste and that's gonna be — 

Jessica: That's not what you want. Not good. Not good.  

David: We have a cannoli cookie, which is the sandwich cookie option. So it's uh, a cookie with a kind of ricotta filling in it. Yeah, the sandwich cookie. And then we have soft chocolate sugar cookies. Jessica, what do you think about sugar cookies in general?  

Jessica: I love them.  

David: Yeah. We had a real debate about these because, are they a holiday cookie? 

And I forget where you landed on this, but I went back and forth with our test kitchen director, Sarah Jampel, like, is this holiday? Is this not? I tasted them. They're so delicious. I think they would be more holiday if we put a little frosting on them. Mm. Then you could put sprinkles on the frosting. 

There's something about frosting that felt a little bit more holiday-ish. We took it. That was divisive though, to the hive mind. It was. And I forget where you landed. Were you pro or anti frosting?  

Jessica: You know, I forget where I landed too, because they're both really delicious. The cookie on its own, just with sugar on the outside is very good. 

Doesn't look spectacular, but it tastes so good. It's got such a rich cocoa flavor. I feel, I have mixed feelings about an iced cookie. Like it feels a little extra in a way that I don't like. But I, I tried those with the icing on it and I loved them that way too. So I think you can go either way. 

If you were like gonna transport them somewhere or give them to a teacher or something like that, you know, like maybe you wouldn't frost them. 'cause then you can't stack it makes it a little harder. But if you're having them at your cookie party, throw some frosting on there.  

David: Yeah.  

Jessica: Stick on some sprinkles. 

David: I think the reason why the frosting works on this cookie is because it does have that bitter cocoa note in it. And it's got a good amount of salt in it. Yeah. So it really balances the frosting. And I'm with you on a lot of frosted cookies where it just feels like gilding the lily and makes things extra sweet. 

Yeah. This is not the case here. So if you're gonna frost your cookies, make sure you have balance in the cook itself. Yeah.  

Jessica: Yeah. Then the last cookie they developed in the test kitchen is a matcha Christmas tree. Oh. It's a stamped cookie cut with a Christmas tree shaped cutter. Of course, you could use any cutter you wanted. It has matcha green tea powder in the dough.  

David: Mm-hmm.  

Jessica: I think it's one that a lot of people love and delicious and fun way to get a green cookie without using food coloring too.  

David: Right, which we don't use a lot of food coloring in our bakes 'cause we prefer natural food coloring and so we try to avoid it. So yeah, matcha is a good way to color it.  

Jessica: I feel like there's something for everyone here. If you want a cakey sandwich cookie, if you want like a, you know, a snappier shortbread, if you want a biscotti to ship like, and together they make a beautiful plate. If you made these six cookies and only these six cookies, you'd have a lovely assortment.  

David: You'd have your crisp cookie, your shortbread, your iced cookie, your sweeter cookie, a not so sweet cookie. You'd have your biscotti. This is the point when you're making a cookie platter or a cookie box to send to people. Be mindful. Be take some care. Take some care. Think about it. Make a spreadsheet. 

Jessica: Yeah, exactly. We'll put all the recipes to the six new cookies in the show notes, but we'll also put the recipe to the zillions of other holiday cookies that have been developed over the years. If these six cookies aren't your dream lineup, you'll find your dream lineup in there. If you only wanna make one show-stopping cookie, it's on that list. 

If you just wanna ship your biscotti, you'll find those in the list too. You and I are not the only people who are really into holiday cookies. When we started thinking about wanting to do this holiday cookie episode, I knew exactly who I wanted to talk to for this episode, and it is Dan Pelosi, who is the creator behind the incredibly popular Instagram account and website Grossy Pelosi. 

He's also a New York Times bestselling cookbook author. He has a brand new book, Let's Party that came out in September, and it features a whole spread on his annual holiday cookie party. In the spirit of joy and competition, I wanted to talk to him about his holiday cookie party, his sort of philosophy about hosting parties in general. 

And so we asked him to come on the show. After talking to him, I was like, were we separated at birth? Are you actually like my long lost Italian twin? Because we see eye to eye on a lot of things.  

David: I cannot wait to hear this. Dan Pelosi brings so much joy to his cooking. He's just so joyful and seems like a really sweet guy, and that cookie party is legendary. 

My hope is that even though I didn't talk to him for this episode, somehow I get an invitation to that cookie party through you.  

Jessica: I know  

David: You're now my in.  

Jessica: You can be my plus one if I get invited. 

So early on in the planning of this episode, we knew we wanted to focus the full episode on holiday cookies. One episode is honestly not really enough, and then when we were talking about who to have as our special guest, David and I were like, the obvious choice is Dan Pelosi, because for those of our listeners who don't already know you, I think one of your calling cards is this holiday cookie party that you throw every year.  

Dan: I mean, thank you. I'm honored. First of all that you thought of me and I do sort of peak around the holidays with my cookie.  

Jessica: I sort of feel like maybe the invitation to this party, it's like the, you know, it's the Met Gala of the holiday season, you know, like coveted invitation.  

Dan: It's pretty wild. Every year I'm like, where's my list from last year? Who am I inviting? Like I need it to be like the Devil Wears Prada. Yeah. I need someone to whisper people's names in my ears.  

Jessica: So let's talk about, you have done this holiday cookie swap for how many years now?  

Dan: It's like over 10 now. 

It started when I moved to New York City. I lived in an extremely small apartment in the West Village and I just threw, you know, I grew up eating holiday cookies out of tins and trays.  

Jessica: Yeah.  

Dan: All my Italian Americans will know, in other cultures as well. My tradition has evolved because I found myself the entire first cookie party, as one does, talking about the cookies, tell the stories. Mm. People wanted recipes. Mm-hmm. They just want to know everything. You know? I'm really big on when you're hosting, I'm entertaining, like planting some really great conversation pieces, right? Mm-hmm. And so this just became the ultimate conversation piece. And so the next year when I had this much bigger space, I had moved to Brooklyn. 

I was like, the beauty of that day was being able to talk about these recipes and how much they mean to me. And so I invited folks to bring however many cookies they wanted to bake. Of a recipe that had really big meaning to them. Mm-hmm. And then invited them to put them on the table next to mine. The whole day just became about sharing this tradition and sharing the stories and sharing the cookies and people being like, who made this coconut chocolate? Oh, good. And then you met people that way. Yeah, it was really cool.  

Jessica: I like that because I think there's something so big hearted and lovely about that idea and I mean, I'm gonna admit that the reason that I don't have people bring cookies is 'cause I think to myself, those cookies are not gonna be good. Isn’t that awful? 

Dan: Well the table doesn't lie. Cookies that are left on the table. Yeah. I mean it's not a competition. I do not claim a winner. I think that's insane. I just am like, everything's fine. But yes, I do have a rule that's like if you're not gonna bake them yourselves, don't bring cookies, they won't go on the table. 

Yeah. Yep. And I think the homemade is really the thing. If you don't want to bake, please come, but bring a drink or bring yourself or bring whatever.  

Jessica: So that's the one real rule that you have is no store-bought cookies.  

Dan: No store-bought cookies. It's just not, I love store-bought cookies. I love a bakery, by all means. 

It's just not what the Grossy Holiday Cookie party is about. Yeah. It's a celebration of recipes and making and the act of making and the act of cooking for others and sharing. And storytelling. 

Jessica: So I mean, this is very King Arthur of you. I love that because I think it is about the joy. Yeah. The point is not to make a bakery quality cookie, because if that's what you wanted, people can go to bakeries and buy.  

Dan: Go to the bakeries. Support bakeries. Absolutely. It's just this one specific day that ask is come write your name on the table. Tell people what you made. And then people are gonna hunt you down and talk to you and it's just so fun. And then everyone takes, you know, there's little doggy bags on the table. 

You can take some cookies home. Mm.  

Jessica: It's perfect.  

Dan: Something I write about in my new book, Let's Party, which is all about parties and menus and dinner parties. Yeah. Not parties. It's about inviting people with a menu, giving people the knowledge of what they're getting into. That's what soothes me as a guest, but also sets me up for success as a host. 

My sister and I always joke, if we don't know what we're eating at your house, we're eating before we come over. You know?  

Jessica: Do you always now make the same cookies for your cookie party every year or do you mix it up each year?  

Dan: I like to mix it up. I have new cookies every year that I present. 

This book has six brand new holiday cookie recipes in it, so I'm sure I'll bring some of those to the table this year. Last year I snuck a few on the table 'cause I was developing the book. But no, I always love to bring some of the classics. The ones that people always take. And then I like to bring some new ones and like, you know, you'll probably understand this, but like one of the best things that people in the food space who work on recipes, who write recipes, my favorite thing in the whole world and the way that I relax is like, I just wanna make someone else's recipe. 

Jessica: Like, yeah, hopefully it's been tested and I could just like — 

Dan: I'll be like, oh my God, that recipe that just came out in the Times, or I've been looking at this Smitten Kitchen recipe for forever and I'll just make it. 'cause we should be in celebration of each other as well as ourselves.  

Jessica: I think that's true. 

I also have a codified assortment of cookies that I make every year for this cookie party. And I think people look forward to them 'cause it's the only time of the year that I make them. But I do try and always introduce a wild card. I like making the same cookies, but there's so many and I feel like what if there's the undiscovered total gem that I haven't made yet.  

Dan: Well, yeah, and I think that's the spirit of all of my entertaining parties, and I think most of them are like a eight person affair, but when, when it's a cookie party, inviting other folks to the table with their food is really lovely and really and supportive. 

Just kind of like the holiday. Spirit of sharing. And you know, I've had people leave my party with like a couple bags full of cookies and then they like turn them into gifts where like, they're wrong and they go, you know, like they'll be like, this is from the holiday cookie party. And I'm like, awesome. 

Jessica: Well, I can't wait for my invitation to come to your party. I promise I'll bring my best selection. And if you need some handholding beyond what you've offered here, there is this fabulous section in your new book Let's Party that tells people how and what to do to throw the Grossy Pelosi holiday cookie party of their dreams. 

So I expect to see nationwide. You know, nationwide, Grossy Pelosi holiday parties. It's such a treat to talk to you, and I love talking about holiday cookies. I especially love talking about holiday cookies with you. Thank you for being so generous with your time, your knowledge, and your good vibes. Happy holidays to you. 

Dan: You too. And I hope we talk again real soon.  

Jessica: Yeah, me too. Thank you. Holiday time is cookie time, and this episode is brought to you by our new line of baking scoops. You know, if you're baking a lot of cookies this season, which I definitely am, I mean, what else am I gonna do? One of the most time consuming parts is scooping all of that cookie dough. I mean, hello carpal tunnel. That painstaking task becomes, dare I say it, a breeze with these baking scoops.  

David: Yeah, a true breeze. And one of my favorite things about these baking scoops is that now I can finally stop scooping cookie dough with my bare hands. I like the small ones. I like the big ones. I like, I really have them all because, uh, then I'm ready to tackle cookies and baked goods of any size. 

Jessica: And you can find our new line of baking scoops in our online shop at kingarthurbaking.com  

David: It's time for our next segment, Ask the Bakers. For Ask the Bakers, we wanna hear from you. If you have a baking question for us, head to kingarthurbaking.com/podcast to record a voice message, and we may end up using it on the show. That's kingarthurbaking.com/podcast.  

Jessica: And don't forget, if you are in the middle of a batch of cookie dough and you have a baking question that simply cannot wait, you can always reach out to our Bakers Hotline via phone, email, or online chat. 

Just go to kingarthurbaking.com/bakers-hotline. That's kingarthurbaking.com/bakers-hotline or call us (855) 371-2253. That's 2 2 5 3 as in BAKE.  

David: That really is why AI was invented, like why Siri exists. Because if you have your hands full of dough, you can just say, Hey Siri, call the King Arthur hotline and you don't have to touch your phone. 

Jessica: It's true. People should just program that into their phones.  

David: Let's hear our questions.  

Caller: I have a question. Um, cookies are my all-time favorite food and I have a really great recipe, but I feel like they're a tiny bit too cakey for me and I'm wondering what I can do to make them a little bit less cakey and a little more cookie. 

Jessica: Cookies are also my all-time favorite food. I recently was asked to rank categories of things like with cakes over cookies, donuts over blah, blah, and I was like, cookies, cookies, cookies, cookies.   

David: Were you like at a speed dating event?  

Jessica: I was doing some promotional stuff for Sweet and Salty!, the kids book and they — 

David: The, the holiday present of the season. 

Jessica: True. If you've got small people. It's the book. Um, anyway, they asked me to rank these things, which I felt like was unfair. They were like, pastries, cookies, cakes, cookies, you know, and I just, cookies came out on top every time and I stand by it. So this caller and I have a lot in common already.  

David: We do have some advice for this caller. 

Do you want me to start? Jessica, would you wanna start?  

Jessica: Well, I think we're gonna be a bit like broken records about this, but we don't know if this caller is using a scale, one of the main contributing factors to a cookie being cakey. I mean, obviously there are some cookie formulations that are intended to be one texture or the other, like a crispy cookie, a cakey cookie, you know, and you'll have some indication of that in the head note of the recipe or the title of the recipe. 

But suppose you don't. And you know, you're making these cookies and you're not using a scale. It's very possible you could be adding, you know, a just a small amount of additional flour. A tablespoon or two could make a dramatic difference in the texture of your cookie. If you're using an older cookie recipe that doesn't have weights in it, then I think we go back to the old King Arthur fluff sprinkle sweep. So you fluff up your flour in the bag, you sprinkle it into your measuring cup, and then use a bench scraper or a butter knife to scrape it level.  

David: Mm-hmm.  

Jessica: And then you'll be ensuring that you have a consistent cup of flour every time. If the recipe has metric conversions and you're not using them, I would say get a scale and start using them. 

If you don't have a scale, you could try just like backing off on the flower a little bit, like taking out, I'd start with just a little bit, like a tablespoon of flour. We have a blog about this, where we talk about the benefit of making a test cookie, and I think there's something to that. So you could take like a tablespoon of flour to the recipe bake one, see if you like the texture. And then if you needed to add more, you could, right?  

David: Mm-hmm.  

Jessica: Before you made the whole batch, right? 

David: So I think that's a great piece of advice. Just pull back on the flour a little bit, see if that makes a difference. If that doesn't work or you wanna try a different way, you could also back off of the leavening just a little bit. 

Sometimes if you have too much leavening. It's gonna cause your cookie to rise and then fall flat. So you could try backing off a little bit on the leavening and see if that makes a difference to see if it gives it less rise and then it's less cakey. And then also this is gonna be an irritating piece of advice to hear. It's very parental advice. Just find a recipe that's not cakey.  

Jessica: Yeah.  

David: Like a shortbread or something like that. Some cookies are just never going to be cakey. Especially. Yeah, that's true. Cookies that don't have eggs in them and that have a short texture. Find a cookie that's just butter, flour, sugar, salt. 

And you'll definitely won't get something cakey unless like, you know, unless you put too much flour in.  

Jessica: Yeah. And even then, like the world peace cookies, no matter what you do, they're not gonna be a cakey cookie, and that's just not the way that they're formulated. So you would be looking for one that has a higher ratio of butter. 

Probably no eggs or maybe one egg. And it's hard to know, 'cause this call said that they have a recipe that they like, but we don't know what it was. If she was saying by making a ricotta cookie and it's too cakey, I would say, you're outta luck. 'cause that by its very design is meant to be cakey. But things like a chocolate chip cookie, an oatmeal cookie, a peanut butter cookie, like there are so many formulations out there. 

So you could experiment and try, you know, try and find one that's just a little bit more textually pleasing to you like  

David: A sable.  

Jessica: Exactly.  

David: I just wanted to see if I could pronounce that word right. Yeah. You're just, I'm terrified of pronunciations on this podcast. I'm terrified of pronouncing things wrong. 

Jessica: Well, you know, to err is human, you know. Thank you. Should we listen to another, should we listen to another baking question? 

David: Yeah, let's do it.  

Caller: I love making cutout cookies for the holidays, but mine always spread out on the pans so much while I'm baking. How can I make sure my cutout cookies keep their shape? 

Jessica: Good question. I cut out a lot of cookies. My kids love to cut them out and decorate them. You, you want them to come out of the oven as crisp and well-defined as they go in the oven, you know? Mm-hmm. Like you don't want 'em to spread and lose their nice shape. Mm-hmm. Some of that, I think, is rolling the dough to the proper thickness. 

The recipe dictates if you roll it too thin, then your cookies are gonna frizzle on the edges and melt out a little bit, and you'll lose that nice definition. I typically, this is also like a getting ahead trick. I will make my sugar cookie dough, or my gingerbread cookie dough, and a lot of recipes tell you, make your dough, wrap it into a disc and refrigerate it. 

Then when you're ready to, you know, bake them to take it outta the refrigerator, let it come up to temperature and roll it out. I find this very annoying because it actually takes a decent amount of time for a butter cookie dough to come up to a rollable temperature. I'm a very impatient, so you're waiting, you're whacking it with your rolling pin, trying to get it soft enough and then roll it. 

And so what I do now is I will make my dough and I'll give it just a brief chill, like maybe just in the mixing bowl for 20 minutes. Then I take the dough out and I roll it between sheets of parchment, so like without chilling it for a long time. And then it's very easy to roll. And then I stack those sheets of rolled out dough on a cookie sheet, wrap it in plastic wrap, store in my freezer. 

So then if my kids wanna make a few sugar cookies, I can just pull out one sheet of dough. I know it's rolled to the right thickness. It's deeply chilled. 'cause I think that's key to maintaining its shape. And you know, I think one of the challenges, and I can say this as somebody that wrote our kids' cookbook, is that kids are a lot of things, but patient is not chief among them. 

These cookies benefit not only from being chilled at the dough stage, but also once you have cut out your shapes. I like to chill them again before they go into the oven and my kids get their hot hands all over them. That dough is already warmed up. That can also cause them to lose that sort of definition, chilling them for 15 or 20 or 30 minutes. 

Before you put them in the oven will help them retain their shape. And lastly, some of it is the recipe and the formulation. We have a great recipe for soft frosted sugar cookies on our site. We'll put it in the show notes. And that uses the reverse creaming method, which we have talked about in this podcast before, where you mix together the flour and the butter and then you add your wet ingredients to your eggs. 

And that's a great recipe. You get a nice texture to those and they hold their shape really well.  

David: Those are some great tips. And if I, can I add just one more thing? Mm. It's also about temperature. You really need to dial in your oven temperature. You really need to understand if your oven's running hot or low. 

Yeah, and as we've talked about before, people often think that when their cookies are spreading, it's because their oven is too hot. It may be because the oven's too cold. If your oven is not hot enough, it will not set the cookie in time. The cookie will lose its shape because you know you really need to hit that, that sweet spot of hot enough to set the edges, but not hot, too hot. Calibrate your oven, get an oven thermometer, and make sure that your oven is the temperature that you think it is.  

Jessica: Yeah, and that's a good tip for any holiday cookie, especially these cookie cutouts. Yep. Let's take our last question.  

Caller: Hey, King Arthur. Royal icing is so annoying and it doesn't even taste good. 

So do you have a suggestion for something I could use to decorate cookies that would be a better option? Thanks.  

Jessica: I do not mess with royal icing.  

David: I think that if you are not skilled at decorating, royal icing is probably gonna be more frustrating. Like our colleague Mel Wanders, who did our great on demand class for cookie decorating, to see her work with royal icing and the things she can do with it's, it's crazy amazing. 

So if you want to get better, then you gotta get down with royal icing. But for the rest of us, that's not our passion. I think there are lots of other options. One thing I love is a cookie that's half dipped in chocolate. I love a shortbread cookie that's half dipped in chocolate. I like the gingerbread flavors and like the fall spice, the warm spice flavors with chocolate too. 

Mm-hmm. So I would even dip a sturdier molasses cookie or ginger cookie and chocolate or maybe white chocolate. It's very easy to get a clean line and it's pretty, and it tastes good. So that's one thing. And then the other thing that other very simple decorating move that I love, that you can apply to a lot of cookies if they're slice and bake. You can roll any slice and bake cookie in sparkling sugar. Of any color. And that just adds bling and a little crunch too. Some King Arthur recipes have you putting a little egg wash on the roll of cookies before you roll it in sugar and cut it. That's not a bad idea because it really gets the sparkling sugar to stick. 

Jessica: Yeah, exactly. And I think we'll call it as we see it, which is that royal icing is there for looks if you have your heart set on that type of lavishly decorated iced cookie. I can't do it. It is not something I'm terribly interested in learning to do. If you are, you have made a choice, which is that you are going for. 

The cookie can still taste good, but you're not putting the royal icing on there. 'cause you're like, oh, royal icing is so delicious. You're putting it on there because it's an edible medium that you can do these very beautiful and exciting designs since I am not that person. But as I said, we do make a lot of sugar cookies in our house. 

I just make an American buttercream, so you know, a stick of softened butter, unsalted butter, confectioners sugar, vanilla extract, and I just put that on my cookies. It does not get firm and shiny the way a royal icing does. So you can't stack them, but it's very tasty. Sprinkles will stick to it. Red Hots will stick to it, and that seems to be the main desire of my children to have some sort of glue that will hold on an insane amount of, yeah, decorations, but it's very tasty. 

Like I think of vanilla butter frosting on a crispy sugar cookie is nice. And of course you can color that with natural food coloring. And so I will often do that as an alternative if we wanna have a decorated cookie in the classic sugar cookie tradition. And I think that's really tasty too. Good idea. 

Love it. If you want to have a glaze that does set up, you know, shiny and hard, but tastes a little bit better than royal icing, we have a recipe for a simple cookie glaze on our site. Instead of using egg whites like royal icing, it uses a little bit of corn syrup along with confectioners sugar and milk, and it sets up firm like a royal icing, but is more flavorful, and you can color that as well. 

David: Yes, lots of good options. Lots of good options. So follow your bliss. We just gave you a thousand ways to decorate your holiday cookies. 

Every episode we like to check in with Jessica to hear what wildly surprising and full-throated ideas are in our head, a segment we lovingly call Jess-opinions. Jessica, what is your holiday cookie Jess-opinion?  

Jessica: This one was so easy for me to come up with every year. You see things come out on different media outlets where they talk about the top 10 holiday cookies or the best holiday cookies by region. Inevitably, on that list of 10 or 20, there is always chocolate chip cookies.  

David: Hmm.  

Jessica: I love a chocolate chip cookie. True fans who listen to season one know that was our first episode. I love chocolate chip cookies so deeply. So passionately and like for 300 and say 15 to 20 days of the year that is the cookie that I want, but those other 45 days are not chocolate chip cookie season. 

And I'm sorry, a chocolate chip cookie is not a holiday cookie. It does not belong on your holiday cookie platter. It should not be shipped as your holiday cookie. I don't care if you swap in red and green m and m’s for the chocolate chips.  

David: Well then you're an m and m cookie.  

Jessica: So I know that a lot of people disagree with me, and maybe it's people that only bake cookies around the holidays are gonna bake a chocolate chip cookie. 

David: Mm-hmm.  

Jessica: But the rest of you have no excuse. A chocolate chip cookie is not a holiday cookie. And it is not open for discussion. Case closed.  

David: I can hear the passion in your voice and I love it. What happens when you go to a holiday party and you see a chocolate chip cookie on the plate? What do you do?  

Jessica: Oh, I just upend the whole table. Like the incredible Hulk. I'll just ignore it. I won't see it.  

David: Just, you ignore it. You're like, I suppose, Jessica, would you like a chocolate cookie? Hmm. I don't see that. Um, what?  

Jessica: Of course, if I was at a party during the month of December and chocolate chip cookies were the only cookie served, I guess I would eat it, I suppose.  

David: But yeah, I agree with you here. It just does not give me holiday vibes. No. A classic chocolate cookie does not give me holiday vibes. However, you do have something working against you here, which is that blue tin.  

Jessica: Oh, I love those.  

David: Well, there's a chocolate chip cookie. Anyway, let's clarify the blue tin of, what is it? Danish butter cookies. 

Jessica: Yeah.  

David: But there is a chocolate chip cookie in there.  

Jessica: Is it really a chocolate chip cookie? No, it's a butter cookie that has some specks of chocolate in it. I would not call that a chocolate chip cookie.  

David: Oh, well, all of a sudden this line got very thin. What is a chocolate chip cookie? What is not?  

Jessica: So what can they need to go? We might have to record a second chocolate chip cookie episode. Those are not like a traditional chocolate chip cookie for a store-bought cookie. I do think those Danish butter cookies are better than they have to be. I mean, I know there's, I know they're sold at Walgreens, but I think they're pretty good for store bought cookie. 

But enough about what I won't be baking. I wanna ask you what holiday cookie, other than the biscotti that you're gonna mail to a select number of loved ones as determined by your number of collected cardboard boxes. Yep. What are you going to make for your holiday cookie this year?  

David: I'm gonna give you two. Okay. As I've talked about on the show before, I am a dual holiday human. I celebrate a lot of different holidays. I have family members that I celebrate Christmas with and Hanukkah with. For Hanukkah, I do love rugelach, a classic cream cheese dough. We have a great one on the site. I like a chocolate rugelach. 

I also like the cinnamon walnut, but I prefer a chocolate situation. I really love a classic piped shortbread cookie for the holidays. I love to dip it in chocolate and then dip it in sprinkles. It's kind of like that classic gives Italian American vibe. Yeah, vibe. Definitely. Definitely. That's what you would see in a lot of Italian American bakeries. 

Yeah, and it also gives me Danish shortbread vibe. Yeah, it's just a classic butter cookie. Butter is a key part of the holidays, especially end of year holidays, so I like to lean into it with a classic butter cookie, piped vanilla shortbread cookies will, I'll put that link in the show notes.  

Jessica: I think that's a great one. 

And I also think the piping, you know, use a star tip for that. Mm-hmm. And so it makes it a little fancy. Yeah. Like, you know, the dough is simple enough, but like the piping and the dipping makes it a little fancy. And then you could put some sprinkles if you wanted, or some chopped pistachios on the end of it. I think that's very elegant.  

David: So what about you? What are you baking?  

Jessica: Yeah, I mean, I know we talked about a lot of this codified things I make for my holiday party, but another one that I like to make is our whipped lemon shortbread. I think that's a really special cookie. It's funny because we think about warm baking spices, peppermint, chocolate, all of those being flavors of the holiday. But you know, these holidays do fall at citrus season too. And so I think lemon is an appropriate choice and it sort of brightens up an assortment of cookies. And these have a little bit of masa harina in them. So they have a, like a deep corn flavor. 

And as the name suggests, they are a whipped cookie. So they have a really nice light texture. And so I'm gonna make those. So I was thinking, wouldn't it be interesting. Half dip these or do chocolate footer on these lemon shortbread. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I might try that with some of them. We'll put that recipe in the show notes for your consideration. 

I mean, there's no way to go wrong when you're making a holiday cookie. Or except for one, which we discussed. As we said, we have folks standing by if you have baking questions, you can call the hotline. While the holidays can be like a lovely and joyful time, also can be sort of stressful. So if we can alleviate some of that stress when it comes to baking, we are happy to do that. Thank you for tuning in and joining us here on Things Bakers Know. We are gonna be off for the next few weeks celebrating the holidays with our friends and family, but we will be back for a very special bonus episode about our recipe of the year in early January. 

Then we're gonna be back with a full batch of episodes for season three in the spring.  

David: Yeah, excited about that. In the meantime, please remember to like and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, on YouTube, on Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.  

Jessica: And leave us a review or share this episode with a friend. 

David: We will see you back here in a few weeks. In the meantime, it's very important around the holidays, follow the recipe. Things Bakers Know is hosted and executive produced by me, David Tamarkin.  

Jessica: And me, Jessica Battilana.  

David: Rossi Anastopoulo is our senior producer. Chad Chenail is our producer. And Marcus Bagala is our engineer. Original music by Megan and Marcus Bagala.  

Jessica: This episode featured cookbook author and recipe developer Dan Pelosi, also known as Grossy Pelosi. You can learn more about his work and his latest cookbook, Let's Party, at danpelosi.com. 

David: Things Bakers Know is a King Arthur Baking Company podcast.