Being we had our first blizzard of the year, I thought it more then appropriate to celebrate with making my 3-D Christmas Cookie Tree!
It was just a mini blizzard, about 4″ of accumulation, but it snowed for at least 12 hours! And below is what I woke up to on Saturday morning. Isn’t it gorgeous!
I had planned on another cookie for our first snow of the year, but I finally bought my Star Tree Cookie Cutter Set and I couldn’t wait to try it out! Here’s a similar set for reference, Cookie Tree Cutter Kit.
The below recipe is a huge cookie recipe and you will have more then enough dough to make the Star Cookie Tree. And you can use any cookie cutter with multiple graduated sizes to make the tree. A snowflake cookie cutter would be so pretty! And how gorgeous would this be on a holiday buffet and it would take up far less room then laying the cookies out on a platter!
Classic Sugar Cookies
Recipe adapted from Saveur Magazine
6 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. kosher salt
3 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups (3 sticks)
unsalted butter,
softened
1 tbsp. vanilla extract
3 eggs
Decoration:
Sanding sugar, jimmies, edible pearls
Makes about 24 large cookies
1. Whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl; set aside. In a mixer fitted with a paddle, beat together sugar, butter, and vanilla until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time; beat. Add dry ingredients; mix. Transfer dough to a floured surface; divide into 4 pieces. Shape each piece into a flat disk; wrap each disk in plastic; chill 1 hour.
2. Heat oven to 325°. Working with 1 disk at a time, roll to 1/8″ thickness on a floured surface. Using various large cookie cutters, cut out shapes and place on parchment paper—lined baking sheets, spacing cookies 2″ apart. Reroll and cut scraps. Bake until lightly browned, 12–15 minutes. Let cool. Decorate with royal icing, sprinkles, and sugars.
To Make the Star Cookie Tree:
There are 10 Cookie Cutters in my set and some of the sizes are used multiple times.
Decorate the cookies and bake. Stack them up adjusting to emphasize each layer. Sprinkle with powdered sugar. Display and enjoy!
To decorate the cookies I used jimmies in 2 shades of green. To decorate the tree topper star I used the jimmies, yellow sanding sugar and an edible pearl.
NOTE: Edible pearls will melt in the oven so they are applied after the cookies have cooled. For the tree topper I attached the pearl with just a tad of melted chocolate which acts like a glue.
Our Christmas Cookie Crew:
Tiffany of The Nesting Project
Judy of No Fear Entertaining
Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Di of Di’s Kitchen Notebook
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Michelle of BigBlackDog
RJ of Flamingo Musings
Sandy of At the Baker’s Bench
Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes
A friend of mine, Heather of He Cooks She Cooks, has developed the cutest Advent Calendar. You just click a day and it opens to wonderful holiday cookies, snacks and treats. Please visit and see what holiday goodies are waiting for you!
AllRightsReserved©BigBlackDog
That is so cool! It would be fun to make. The snow is beautiful. I don’t have snow but I am making cookies today!
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Michelle Safirstein, Michelle Safirstein and Michelle Safirstein, Cindy . Cindy said: RT @BigBlackDogs: 1st Christmas Cookie of the year, a 3-D Christmas Cookie Tree! & celebrating first blizzard! http://tinyurl.com/296rquf [...]
adorable and wow loads of snow we had a dusting yesterday but all gone today!
This is so pretty! Must have taken forever, but it’s a work of art.
Wow, this is beautiful for the dessert table on the holidays!
Just gorgeous! I can see this as the centerpiece of a holiday dessert buffet.
Oh – fixed your link on my post… and pssst…. Andrea is participating, this year!
so so adorable, and your backdrops and accessories make the picture that much cuter! what a very delicious looking tree!
Love your cookie tree and the picture of your puppy. We had our rottweiler Zeke for 11 yrs. He was our 6th child, our furry son. Look forward to more of your recipes.
Just love the tree cant say I have seen the green decorations here but I will go looking
Oh wow…what a beautiful Christmas cookie tree! Must be so fun to make!
I would love to try too. Beautiful winter scene. There’s blizzards in Scotland, too….so cold!! Need to have some fun with baking to keep the blues aways 
I love it! Both the tree and your snow. =) We hardly ever get snow here, and I miss it sometimes. The cookie tree is a wonderful idea–my girls would have a blast making something like that.
That is so pretty! I love the snow photos too. Thanks.
That is incredibly cute!
So beautiful!
Love the Christmas cookie tree, Michelle. It’s beautiful! Today I made some lemon poppyseed melts, and the other day some chocolate truffle cookies. It’s beginning to look a lot like COOKIES around here! Gotta get me some of those lovely star cookie cutters
Beautiful, love what you did with the sugar cookies. We also make a cookie tree using our family’s gingerbread cookie recipe. The boys love decorating it.
This is the perfect Christmas table topper!! Your tree looks fabulous
Brilliant idea to make the cookie tree ~ so pretty! I love it.
Oh my gosh, such a cute idea! I wonder how we could make a tree with all the cookie varieties….
What a beautiful post! My first time to your blog…found your post link on Never Enough Thyme. I’m so glad I clicked over. Thanks!
This is the prettiest way to present cookies I’ve ever seen. I just love this idea, Michelle, and am so happy you shared it with us!
Hi Michelle – thanks for stopping by my blog, so happy to have found yours! I love the idea of a cookie tree, seems like an excellent excuse to make cookies. I envy you your snow – so pretty. I’m in San Diego – sun today, but snow would make it seem more like Christmas!
That is lovely Michelle!
This is so pretty! Must have taken forever, but it’s a work of art.