These are the recipes for the cookies I baked for Christmas this year. Enjoy!

Pignoli Cookies
Found on some website a few years ago, not my grandmother’s recipe but they taste pretty close.

• 8 oz almond paste
• 2 egg whites, slightly beaten
• 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup flour
• pinch salt
• 1 cup pine nuts

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Lightly grease cookie sheets.
2. Beat the almond paste and egg whites on low speed until smooth. Add both sugars and mix well. Add flour and salt, mixing well.
3. Pinch off small pieces of dough and roll into balls the size of walnuts. Dip and press into the pine nuts.
4. Place on cookie sheets and bake for about 25 minutes until firm to the touch.

Yields about 2 dozen

Chip & Dip Cookies
from my friend Nadine Cleveland

Cream together 1 lb of room temperature butter (I use margarine),
1 cup plus 2 Tbsp of sugar and 2 tsp of vanilla. Add 3 cups
of flour and 1 cup of finely crushed (Lay’s) potato chips (I
use my mini food chopper). Then add 1 and 1/2 cup of
chopped pecans. Drop on a lightly greased (I use pan spray)
cookie sheet and bake at 350o for 12 minutes. Do not
overbake. Cool slightly before removing from cookie sheet.
They are really good and it is fun to get people to try and
guess the secret ingredient.

Jazzy Chazzie’s Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies (follow link for recipe)
(I always make a few with dried cherries instead of cranberries, too.)


Toffee Cookies
My Aunt Ethel would make these, and I’ve been making them for my entire adult life. Huge hit!

• 1 cup butter
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 cup flour
• six 1.65 ounce Hershey bars (or whatever size they come in these days)
• 2/3 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350°F. Cream the butter, brown sugar, and egg yolk. Add the flour, blend well. Spread dough into lightly greased 15.5” x 10.5” x 1” jelly roll pan (it will spread thinly.)Put in oven for 15-20 minutes.After removing from oven lay chocolate on top. When bars melt, spread over toffee layer. Sprinkle nuts on top. Cut when completely cool.

Gingerbread cookies (with confectioners’ sugar glaze)
I used a mix, then dipped them in this simple glaze:

Glaze:

• 1 1/3 cups confectioners’ sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoons red & green nonpareil sprinkles, for decoration (optional)

1. Make the glaze: In a small bowl, whisk together the confectioners’ sugar, 2 tablespoons water, and the vanilla until the mixture forms a thick but pourable glaze (add more water if necessary).
2. Dip the top of each cookie into the glaze and let set, rounded side up, on a rack set over a piece of parchment paper. Sprinkle with non-pareils, if using. Allow the glaze to set, about 20 minutes. Store the cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days.

Toll House (recipe on the bag of Nestlé semi-sweet morsels)