Spritz
Spritz Cookies are a very popular Christmas cookie, not only in Germany and Scandinavian countries, but also in North America. They have a lovely vanilla flavor and a rich buttery texture that is tender crisp.
As their name implies, "Spritz" is German for "spritzen" meaning "to squirt." These cookies are made using a cookie press, a device that has a cylindrical barrel made of clear plastic and stainless steel with an easy-to-squeeze trigger, that "squirts" the soft dough through a decorative template giving us all sorts of wonderful looking cookies. Popular shapes are wreaths, flowers, trees, rosettes, stars, and stripes, to name a few. If you don't have a cookie press, use a pastry bag with tip.
The dough is also often colored: for Christmas I like to use green for Christmas trees and wreaths, red for spirals, and white for camels. These happen to be the shapes my cookie press came with. And while they are delicious plain, they look so pretty when decorated with cinnamon candies, candied cherries, nuts, colored sprinkles, colored sugars, etc.
+Jane's Spritz Cookies
1 cup (2 sticks) butter or margarine
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 tablespoon vanilla or 1 teaspoon almond extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
food colorings (optional)
Beat butter and sugar, with a mixer on high speed, 5 minutes or
until light and fluffy. Add egg, vanilla, and salt. Beat until blended.
On low speed, gradually beat in flour. Add a few drops of food coloring
for colored cookies.
Press out cookies about 2 inches apart onto ungreased baking sheets. Decorate with colored sugars or colored sprinkles.
Bake 10 to 12 minutes until just turning lightly golden around the edges. Cool briefly on pan, then transfer with a broad spatula to wire rack to cool completely.
Approx 64 cookies
*Mom's Spritz Cookies
1 cup (2 sticks) butter or margarine
1/2 cup sugar
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla or almond extract
food colorings (optional)
Cinnamon candies (optional)
Cream together the butter and the sugar until light and fluffy. Add the flour, salt, egg, and vanilla or almond extract.
Divide the dough and add food coloring if desired. Plain (white), red, and green are nice for Christmas. The total amount of dough is a little over 2 1/4 cups, so if you use three colors, you have about 3/4 cup of dough for each color.
Force the dough through a cookie press onto ungreased cookie sheets. They do not spread much so you can place them fairly close to each other. Decorate with the cinnamon or other candies (as berries on Christmas wreaths, topper on Christmas trees, etc.). I usually put just one cinnamon candy on each cookie.
Bake 7 to 9 minutes at 375 degrees. Do not let them brown. Cool on wire racks.
Makes about 5 dozen small cookies (I get about 4 dozen with my cookie press)
