Name: Snowflakes cookies
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 35 min
Cuisine: american
Ingredients: 153 g (1 stick + 3 tbsp) Butter - unsalted and softened; 135 g (2/3 cup) Brown Sugar; 1 Egg - large at room temperature; 1 tsp Vanilla extract; 150 g (1/3 cup) molasses - or honey + maple syrup mix; 450 g (3 cups) Flour - all-purpose; 1 tsp Cinnamon - ground; 1 tsp Ginger - ground; 1 pinch Nutmeg - ground; 1 pinch Cloves - ground; 1 tsp baking soda - or baking powder; 1 pinch of salt; 400 g (3 1/3 cups)Powdered sugar - sifted; 40 g (3-4 tbsp) Water; Sugar for decoration

How to make a snowflake cookie recipe flavored with gingerbread spices and a beautiful royal icing decoration.

Gingerbread snowflake cookies made with my spiced gingerbread dough and decorated with simple homemade royal icing, perfect for holiday cut-out cookies.

These snowflake cookies have a soft texture, warm gingerbread flavor, and clean shapes that make them easy to decorate for Christmas baking with kids or as edible gifts.

Ingredients you need

Butter: use unsalted butter, which must have a softened texture. Heat it lightly in the microwave if you didn't have time to take it out in advance.
Sugar: preferably flavored sugar such as brown sugar or cane sugar.
Egg: at room temperature
Molasses: A must for gingerbread, but you can replace it with a mixture of honey and maple syrup.
Flour: All-purpose white wheat flour, which can be replaced by another flour or a gluten-free flour mix.
Spices: use a gingerbread mix or cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves spices or my homemade pumpkin pie spice.
Yeast: Use baking soda or baking powder.
Vanilla extract and salt: To flavor and bring out all the taste. You can add other flavors like almond extract or lemon extract.
Powdered sugar: A very fine sugar like powdered sugar, icing sugar or confectioners sugar to have a very smooth icing without grains.
Water: You can replace it with lemon juice.
Food coloring: Optionally you can add color by coloring the icing with gel food coloring.

gingerbread snowflake cookie with royal icing

How to make gingerbread snowflake cookies

Mix butter and brown sugar until smooth and creamy.

Add egg, vanilla, and molasses (or honey and maple syrup) and mix until combined.

Incorporate flour, spices, baking soda, and salt just until a dough forms.

Chill the dough for 30 minutes. Preheat the oven to 175°C and line a baking sheet.

Large bowl with gingerbread sugar cookie dough ball

Roll the dough to 3–4 mm thickness on a lightly floured surface.

Cut snowflake shapes and place on the prepared baking sheet.

Bake for 8–10 minutes until lightly puffed and pale golden.

Cool briefly on the sheet, then transfer to a rack.

Whisk powdered sugar and water until smooth and fluid.

Pipe the icing onto the cookies using a small round tip.

Dust with powdered sugar and remove excess.

Dry for 1 hour until the icing is set.

Storage

At room temperature: Store decorated snowflake cookies in an airtight container for up to 1–2 weeks. Avoid humidity; do not refrigerate or freeze iced cookies.
Freezing: Freeze plain sugar cookies (without icing) for up to 3 months. Thaw gently at room temperature before decorating.

I hope you’ll love this recipe! If you try this recipe, feel free to leave a comment. It always helps. Happy baking!

Snowflakes cookies

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Author: Fadela
Total Time: 35 minutes
Yield: 25 cookies

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Description

Recipe for Christmas gingerbread snowflake cookies with royal icing (For 25-30 large cookies)

Instructions

Sugar cookies

Preheat oven to 347°F / 175°C and line baking sheets with parchment paper.
In a bowl mix together all the dry ingredients, flour, spices, salt and baking soda (if possible sift the dry ingredients twice).
Place the softened butter with the brown sugar in a large bowl and beat with an electric mixer on medium speed for 2-3 minutes until creamy.
Add the egg and vanilla extract and beat again for 1 minute to incorporate.
Then add the molasses and mix for a few moments to obtain a homogeneous mixture.
Add the dry ingredients and mix with a mixer or by hand until you have a smooth ball of dough.
Cover with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.

Shape snowflake cookies and baking

Roll out the dough with a rolling pin on a lightly floured surface or between 2 sheets of baking paper and place the dough disc in the freezer for 10 minutes.
Cut out the snowflake shapes with cookie cutters and place the cookies on the parchment paper-lined baking sheet, leaving a 2 inches / 5 cm space between each cookie.
Bake for about 8 to 10 minutes (depending on the size of the cookies) until they are puffed and lightly browned around the edges.
Remove the snowflakes cookies from the oven and let them cool a bit on the baking sheet before gently moving them to a cooling rack.

Cookies icing

Place the sifted powdered sugar with the water in a large bowl and beat with an electric mixer for about 5 minutes until smooth, thick, and fluid. (If the icing is too fluid add more powdered sugar and mix again and if it is too compact add a little water)
Fill a piping bag with the icing and cut a small opening.
Immediately decorate the cooled sugar cookies and sprinkle on granulated sugar.
Let the cookies dry at room temperature for 1 hour before eating them.