Stained Glass Cookies

Whether you’re making craft cookies or preparing for an upcoming holiday party, consider decorating your cookies with stained glass designs. Kids can get in on the fun by making their favorite gingerbread flavor cookies and decorating them with hard candy for the stained glass effect.

Ingredients

Stained glass window

▢ 1 cup Candies various colors

Instructions

Cookie dough

Dry ingredients - In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and spices - cloves, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg.
Dough - In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream the butter with white and brown sugar until light and fluffy. Add the molasses and egg. Followed by flour mixture, orange, and vanilla extract. Combine well.
Pro tip - Make sure to cream the butter and sugar until the sugar is almost dissolved in the butter and it all becomes very lighter in color.
Chill dough - Divide the dough into two, wrap in plastic wrap, and let chill until firm enough to roll - about 2 hours or overnight.
Pro tip - Do not skip on the chilling time. Otherwise, it will be too soft to roll and the cookies will spread.

Roll and cut cookies

Roll - Roll dough on a lightly floured surface to about ⅛ inch thick.
Pro tip - I use a rolling pin with spacers so the dough is the same thickness all over. If necessary, chill the excess dough before you gather the scraps together and re-roll the cookie dough again.
Large cookie - Use a snowflake cookie cutter, cut the shape and place it on a parchment-lined baking tray.
Center cookie - Use a smaller snowflake cutter (about two sizes smaller) for the center.
Pro tip - You can use the center as a small size snowflake cookie as well.
Fill - Fill the center with crushed candy keeping it well within the cavity.
Hole - If you plan to hang these on the Christmas tree as ornament cookies, make a hole on top using a small round piping tip (about size 5), to tie the string and make sure it's not too close to the edges.

Chill and bake

I usually prefer to chill my cookies in the fridge for 15 minutes while the oven is preheating.
Pro tip - Chilling the cookies is a sure way to ensure the cookies do not spread. You can leave the rolled cookies well wrapped in the fridge for up to 48 hours before baking.
Preheat the oven at 177°C / 350°F / Gas Mark 4. And line 2 x baking trays with parchment paper.
Bake the Christmas tree cookies for 10 to 12 minutes, or until slightly golden around the edges.
Pro tip - If you do not want to frost the baked cookies, you can also add sprinkles or colorful dragees cookies before baking.
Cool - When baked, let the cookies cool in the baking tray. When cool, use a flat spatula to remove them from the tray and cool them on a cooling rack completely before you transfer them to a cookie jar.
Pro tip - If you move the cookies while they are hot the melted candy will spread. Plus you can get scald yourself with hot melted sugar.
I like to dust the cookies with confectioners sugar (powdered sugar).
Pro tip - Alternatively, you can put the frosting in a piping bag and pipe the edges and dust with snow-white sprinkles.

The nutrition information and metric conversion are calculated automatically. I cannot guarantee its accuracy. If this data is important to you please verify with your trusted nutrition calculator. Thank you

Did you make this recipe? Share it with me.Tag @veenaazmanov on instagram or #hashtag it #veenaazmanov