How to make a snowflake cookie recipe flavored with gingerbread spices and a beautiful royal icing decoration. This cookie recipe is delicious with a soft and gingerbread-flavored texture and is perfect for holiday gift-giving or family treats.

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Why you'll love this recipe
Ingredients you need for this recipe
How to make Gingerbread Snowflake Cookies
1 - Gingerbread cookies
Snowflakes cookies

Why you'll love this recipe

When comes to the holiday season, everyone loves to make lots of decorated Christmas sugar cookies to give as gifts like this delicious gingerbread snowflake sugar cookies recipe.

This snowflake cookie recipe with its pretty sugar icing is made with gingerbread-flavored cookie dough, which is a spice blend of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves.

This mix of gingerbread spices gives a delicious flavor to these sugar cookies, which also have a soft texture, different from the classic Christmas sugar cookies recipe.

These cookies have a pretty snowflake shape, cut out with different snowflake cookie cutters and they are decorated with homemade royal icing which is very easy to make and ready in 5 minutes.

So put on your apron to make these snowflake cookies that will be perfect for a decoration party with the kids during the Christmas holidays.

>> See all cookies and shortbread recipes

Ingredients you need for this recipe

Here are the ingredients you will need to make these cookies with possible substitutions, scroll down the page to see the quantities of the ingredients in the recipe card.

Gingerbread sugar cookie dough

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.

Royal Icing

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.

⚠️ You will find the quantities and complete instructions in the recipe card at the end of the page.

gingerbread snowflake cookie with royal icing

How to make Gingerbread Snowflake Cookies

1 - Gingerbread cookies

Cream butter and sugar

Place softened butter and brown sugar in a large bowl and mix with an electric mixer on medium speed for 2 to 3 minutes until smooth and creamy.
Add egg, vanilla extract, and molasses (or honey and maple syrup) and mix again with a mixer for a good minute to incorporate.

Tip: You can make also the dough in a stand mixer with a flat spatula to make the whole recipe.

Large bowl with diced butter and brown sugar

Add dry ingredients

Then add the dry ingredients, flour, spices, baking soda, and salt, previously mixed together and sifted.
And mix again with a mixer or by hand and just enough to obtain a homogeneous dough ball.
Cover the dough with plastic wrap and place it in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.

Tip: To go faster you can roll out the dough directly between 2 sheets of parchment paper and place it in the freezer for 10-15 minutes.

Large bowl with gingerbread sugar cookie dough ball

Baking

Preheat oven to 347°F / 175°C and prepare a baking sheet lined with baking paper.
Roll out the chilled dough on a lightly floured surface to a thickness of 3-4 mm.
Cut out snowflake shapes with a snowflake cookie cutter and place them on the prepared baking sheet.
Bake for 8-10 minutes until the cookies are slightly puffed and lightly golden.
Remove the cookies and let them cool slightly on the baking sheet before moving them to a cake rack to cool completely.

Tip: To get perfect cookie shapes with the cookie cutter, place the baking sheet with the cutout cookies in the freezer for 15 minutes before baking.

2 - Cookies icing

Place sifted powdered sugar and water in a large bowl.
Mix with an electric mixer on high speed for 4-5 minutes until white and fluid.
Put the icing in a piping bag fitted with a small round tip 2 or cut a very small opening.
And decorate your baked cookies by making designs on the top.
Immediately sprinkle on powdered sugar and remove excess.
Let the decorated snowflake cookies dry for about 1 hour to harden the icing.

Tip: The icing should be thick and slightly fluid if its texture is too compact add a few drops of water and if on the contrary it is too liquid then add more powdered sugar.

Conservation

Snowflake cookies can only be stored at room temperature in an airtight container box for up to 1-2 weeks.

Royal icing does not support humidity, so iced cookies cannot be stored in the refrigerator or freezer.

But you can freeze the sugar cookies without the icing for up to 3 months in the freezer placed in storage bags or in a box. Let them thaw gently at room temperature.

Snowflake cookies with royal icing on a table

Plate with gingerbread snowflake cookies

More Christmas recipes

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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)

Ingredients

Gingerbread sugar cookies

153 g (1 stick + 3 tbsp) Butter - unsalted and softened
135 g (⅔ cup) Brown Sugar
1 Egg - large at room temperature
1 tsp Vanilla extract
150 g (⅓ 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

Royal Icing

400 g (3 ⅓ cups)Powdered sugar - sifted
40 g (3-4 tbsp) Water
Sugar for decoration

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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.