It’s that time of year again!  As we do every holiday season, we spent this past weekend making some themed cookies to give out with our family and friends, and now we’re going to share them here.  The ones we made this time around are all pretty easy, and we were able to knock the four cookie recipes out in one afternoon, so we’re happy to have some great holiday treats that were simple to make.  Today we’ll share the easiest one, which we based on this recipe from the New York Times:  some slice-and-bake shortbreads, decorated with fun seasonal sprinkles.  So without further ado, here they are!

To make these, you’ll need:

• 4 sticks of butter
• Sugar
• Flour
• 2 eggs
• Sugar sprinkles – we used red and green, but any colors work

First you’ll make the dough:  fit a stand mixer with a paddle attachment, then add 2 cups of sugar and a large pinch of salt to the mixer’s bowl.  Bring all your butter to room temperature and place it in the bowl as well, then combine everything together on a low speed for 3 minutes, scraping the sides of the bowl as needed, until you have an even mixture.  Separate the egg yolks and whites and add in just the yolks, then beat together, again at a low speed, only until the yolks are incorporated.  Measure out 5 cups of flour and mix that in as well for only about a minute on low speed until the flour is fully combined, scraping down the bowl every so often.  Your dough should look something like this:

For this recipe you’ll only need half the dough, so cut it into two equal pieces – you can cover the other half in plastic wrap and refrigerate it.  Divide the remaining dough in half again and roll each half into a 9-inch tube.  Wrap the tubes in parchment paper and twist the ends closed, then place them in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

When you’re ready, take one of your egg whites and beat it, then brush over the surface of your cookie dough tubes.  On a sheet of parchment paper, lay out horizontal rows of sprinkles in alternating colors, then roll each log in them so the surface is entirely covered in stripes of sprinkles.  You can touch up any bare spots by pressing more sprinkles into the dough.

Cut the tubes into 1/2-inch slices and lay these on baking sheets lined with parchment paper.

Bake at 350°F for 10 minutes, then rotate the sheets and bake for another 10-12 minutes, until the cookies are very lightly brown on the bottom.  Let them fully cool, and then you can eat them!

These are an elevated form of the cookie dough logs you can buy in the grocery store – so they’re pretty simple, created with just a few ingredients, and very easy to make and bake.  They come out looking really fun and seasonal, and you can get pretty creative with the sprinkles:  we liked the striped outside of each cookies, but you can also do a solid color, or mix up all the sprinkles so you get a disco ball effect on the outside, or whatever suits your fancy.  As for how they taste?  Some of the people we shared these with said it was their favorite of all the ones we made.  So these are some great entry-level holiday cookies, and be on the lookout over the next week or so for even more Christmas goodies!