Leftover Cranberry Sauce Christmas Cookies
Last Christmas season, I shared a recipe for my favorite Christmas cookie. It actually isn’t a Christmas cookie, but I only make them at Christmas. This is because they are one of those things that shouldn’t be made often. After all, they are way too good! In fact, these are the first Christmas cookies polished off at the family gatherings, so 2 large pans of them are made every year. The cookie itself is a simple one to make it easily lends itself to variety, so inspiration to experiment came easily. My recent experiment involved leftover cranberry sauce from Thanksgiving and white chocolate, which resulted in a fabulously delicious new version of this cookie. So today I want to share my recipe for Leftover Cranberry Sauce Christmas Cookies with you.
Cranberry sauce is one of those foods that people either love or hate. It’s always on our Thanksgiving dinner because I can’t imagine leaving it off the Thanksgiving table, but there are always leftovers, as we are a divided camp here on it. However, since cranberry sauce freezes well, there’s no need to toss the leftovers. The remaining cranberry sauce is put in the freezer for another use, such as these delicious cookies. In fact, these cookies are so good that you may even win over the cranberry sauce haters to these cookies, as I did.
Leftover Cranberry Sauce Christmas Cookies
It’s the white chocolate on top of these cookies that makes them winners. White chocolate goes with just about anything sweet, including cranberries, not to mention it is a popular and classic pairing. But I also used the white chocolate because very few people around here would eat cranberry cookies around here without having the drizzle of white chocolate to tempt them. Case in point, my husband is not a cranberry sauce eater, but he happily ate many of these cookies!
You can easily double, triple, etc., this recipe and freeze the cookies for Christmas. They are easy to make and will be a success at your gathering. If you don’t have a cranberry sauce recipe, then use this easy one here.
Ingredients
- 1 cup butter, softened
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1/4 tsp. salt
- 1 tsp. almond extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 4 oz. almond paste (NOT almond filling)
- 1 heaping cup whole berry cranberry sauce softened in the microwave a bit.
- 4 oz. white chocolate
Instructions
- Combine butter, sugar, salt, and almond extract in a stand mixer and combine well.
- Add the flour and mix some more.
- Setting aside one cup of dough for the topping, take the rest of the dough and press it into a greased 9 x 9 pan or an 11 x 7.
- Spread the softened cranberry sauce on top of this.
- Next, take the 1 cup of dough set aside and put it back in the mixer. To this, add the almond paste, breaking it into small chunks before adding. Mix for a minute or so to combine.
- Crumble this dough and sprinkle it on top of the cranberry sauce evenly and lightly press down.
- Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes or until edges are lightly browned and the top starts to lightly brown. Don't overbake.
- Let cool.
- Drizzle with melted white chocolate. To do this, I melt chocolate and put it in a piping bag, snipping off the tip.
Notes
Have a blessed day!
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