Fond memories and anticipation of the holiday season almost always include favorite cookie treats. Baking can be time consuming, frustrating and messy. Here are some suggestions to help make your holidays a little easier.
Rolled Cookies
- Roll out dough between two sheets of waxed paper or very lightly-floured parchment paper. In addition to keeping your rolling pin clean and easy to use, this prevents cookies from being hard and dried out.
- Start cutting cookie shapes from the outside edge of rolled dough and work your way in toward the center. This will create fewer scraps and less re-rolling.
- Don't substitute fat in recipes unless you want to change texture. Butter will make flatter, crispier cookies. Margarine makes softer and puffier cookies. Shortening will both puff and crisp, but your cookies will have a shorter shelf-life.
Bar Cookies
- Make clean up easy when making bar cookies. To make a liner for your baking pan, turn the pan upside down and cover it with aluminum foil (heavy duty is best) and form the foil over the edges and corners, completely covering the pan. Leave an inch or two overhang. Carefully remove the foil shape and right the pan, placing the foil inside. It should fit nicely into the pan. This works for most bar bookie recipes but not shortbread-type.
- Always use the size pan that is called for in the recipe. Too big or small of a pan will cause bar cookies to be dried out or gooey in the middle.
Decorating Tips
- Use paste food coloring, not liquid (the type used to color eggs) and you will get more vibrant colors when decorating.
- A clean pair of tweezers can be used to place small sprinkles or decorations on cookies. Much easier and less frustrating than fingers!
- Shake powdered sugar for dusting cookies with a salt shaker.
Baking Tips
- One of the most popular items for baking cookies are silicone baking mats. Using the mats or parchment paper saves a lot of clean up time and also helps cookies bake better.
- For evenly baked cookies, thick, shiny aluminum pans are best. They bake more evenly. If you only have thin pans, double them up.
- Always cool your cookie pans before baking the next batch. If you are rushed, run tepid water over the pan to cool it. Also, rotate pans half way through baking time to insure even baking.
Storing Cookies
- Proper storing extends the life and taste of your holiday baking. Keep cookie types stored separately to avoid cross-taste contamination.
- Store crispy cookies in a container with a loose lid. Add a piece a bread to absorb moisture and keep cookies fresh.
- Bar and soft cookies should be stored in a container with a tight lid. Add a piece of sliced apple to keep them from drying out.
- Store baked cookies inside the freezer, not in the door. Freeze them on cookie sheets, in single layers and then transfer them to storage bags or containers. They can be kept inside the freezer for 4 months.
- Defrost cookies inside storage containers. Moisture will form on the wrappers and not on the cookies, keeping them from getting "soggy".
Sharing Cookies
Cookie exchanges, also called cookie parties, are a great way to save time and still provide your family and friends with a nice variety of delicious treats. The way most exchanges work is a set number of people commit to get together and each brings that same number of one type of cookie in dozens to share. So if 10 people are invited, you would bring 10 dozen cookies. Having people sign up in advance with specific cookie types helps eliminate duplicates or too many of one type.
Sometimes just a few simple hints like these can save you lots of time, a precious commodity during the busy holiday season.
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