Piped Butter Cookies

Perfumed with spice

Free recipe today! Happy holidays!

Despite this recipe being a simple butter cookie, it took many trials. The biggest hurdle was making a dough easy enough to pipe, while still being firm enough to hold its ridges and not collapse into a puddle when baked with a wide tip. It also needed to be tender (and not too dry) when eating. At trial 10 I found the answers in my grandfather’s spritz cookies, which have a bit of egg white in the dough to soften it up for piping and keep their shape in the oven (if you don’t care about the shape at all, there are more tender piped cookie recipes on the internet).

These cookies, once out of the oven, can be eaten immediately. However, like my grandfather’s spritz cookies, they can also be made far in advance, stored, and nibbled on throughout the holiday season (although they’re most delicious within the first week).

I always noticed that my grandfather’s spritz cookies would take on the scent of other cookies they were stored with because of the copious amounts of butter. Then, on a holiday hotline Substack Live with Liz Prueitt last year, I learned about her riff on an old tradition of using whole spices for scent by tucking them into a box of cookies to perfume them. I tried it out this year, and while it takes a few days to perfume, it adds a lovely touch; it’s imperceptible on the nose, but as soon as you take a bite, the flavor releases.

Because the perfume increases over time, these cookies are an ideal holiday gift, especially when bundled with a bottle of SirDavis American Whisky. Like the spice-scented cookies, the whisky is finished in sherry casks making it delicious and balanced in an espresso martini and, paired with the cookies, a decadent digestif at the end of a holiday meal.

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Butter Cookies:
225g butter room temperature or slightly warmer
50g powdered sugar
25g white sugar
1g salt
10-15g vanilla extract (you can replace up to 7g with milk if you want to save some $)
225g all-purpose flour
25g cornstarch
10g egg white

Optional additions:
Candied cherries for decoration
Spices to perfume the cookies (in no way are you limited to these spices, they just came to mind and look nice in a ribbon – if you are using a sachet, you can certainly use different ones eg. cardamom pods, star anise etc!):

• Dried ginger slices

• A few oranges (to peel the zest from)

• Some whole cloves

• Cinnamon sticks

Tools:
Piping bags
Piping tips – I used Ateco 845, Ateco 849, Wilton 4B (similar to Ateco 822), and an unmarked, wide opening but shallow closed-teeth, French star tip that I’ve had for ages
Box(es) for storing/gifting the cookies (these are the ones I used)
Ribbon for tying together the spice bundles or wax paper bags to fill with spices and put at the bottom of the box

You can find ingredient information and tips for conversions on my conversion cheat-sheet page. If you have any further questions, please feel free to leave a comment!

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Please be aware that these cookies need to rest overnight so they don’t melt into a puddle. Please plan accordingly!

Place the softened butter, powdered sugar, white sugar, salt, milk, and vanilla extract in a bowl or the bowl of your stand mixer. Beat until the sugar and milk are incorporated and the mixture is smooth. You are not looking to get this light and fluffy – if you incorporate too much air, the cookies will spread when they bake.

Once smooth, add the flour and cornstarch, mixing to combine. Then, add the egg white and mix again until fully incorporated.

Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Fit your piping bag with your tip of choice. Fill the piping bag with approximately 1/4th of your cookie dough. Then, massage the cookie dough in the piping bag to warm it up a bit. This will make it easier to pipe.

Then pipe the cookies however you please! It’s nice to do one design, but you can also do multiple, as I did. Feel free to watch the video and see below for the instructions and tools.

O shape: Holding the piping bag close to the parchment, pipe a circle shape (you can also trace O shapes on the opposite side of the parchment and follow those to make them perfect. or dust a small round cookie cutter in cocoa powder and tap on the parchment to create a guide you can pipe directly on). I used a Wilton 4B tip (similar to Ateco 822).

Straight line: Pipe horizontally with a slight angle. You will likely need to use your finger to break off and smoosh the ends. I used an Ateco 849 tip.

Shell shape: Hold the bag really close to the parchment at an angle and pipe a shell that fans out (vs. fanning up). Place a halved candied cherry closer to the ‘front’ of the shell, and then pipe another shell on top. I used an Ateco 845 tip.

Circle shape: Pipe a circle vertically, about ½” above the parchment (very important to pipe from straight above, not an angle, which is harder than it seems). Place a halved candied cherry in the center. I used a closed star tip with a very wide opening, shallow ridges, and many teeth (these are not really available online, but can be found at cake supply stores).

Once done piping, place the 2 sheets of cookies, uncovered, in the fridge overnight.

The following day, transfer the cookies to the freezer to firm up, and preheat the oven to 325f. Place a rack in the upper 1/3rd of your oven, and allow the oven to preheat for a full 30 minutes (even if it says it’s reached temp).

Once the oven has heated for 30 minutes, bake the cookies 1 tray at a time in the rack at the upper 1/3rd of your oven. Bake for 12-17 minutes (depending on the size of your design: very thin, filigree-piped cookies will cook quickly, but the larger sizes will take a bit longer). These will go from just barely set to burned very quickly (because of all the butter), so play it safe with the timer and check often. When done, the cookies will just begin to brown at the edges. Remove from the oven and let cool fully before removing them from the pan. Repeat with your 2nd tray of cookies.

Once cooled, divide the cookies between your cookie boxes.

If adding spices: depending on how big or small the cookie boxes are, and how spiced you want your cookies to be, you can play around with the spices you add. Tie larger spices together with a ribbon, or, if they’re too small to tie, tuck them into a wax paper bag and place them at the bottom of the box. You may, like me, need to break some of the spices into smaller pieces. Place the cookies and spices in the box together. Allow the cookies to perfume for a minimum of 3 days, and are best in the 5-7 day window.