Santa's Bakeshop

We were Santa's little baking elves the weekend before Christmas!

Jeff's favorite Christmas cookie is spritz. You know, the little butter cookies you put in a gun and press out.

And when I say "butter", I mean butter:

This is for a quadruple batch by the way.  I definitely had enough to bring to my Bunco Christmas party (which was the idea!).

We used real butter this year instead of margarine. I think they taste so so so much better!  But the dough behaved differently - it spread out more when it was baked, and the dough was very tough to put in the gun.  

We used Land O Lakes salted butter this year, but made sure to eliminate the salt in the recipe so they turned out fine.  (Next time though we will used unsalted butter.)

We have a great set up - three trays going (one in the oven, one being prepped, and one cooling on the counter).  Using a cool tray is key with these cookies otherwise they tend to spread and crisp up on the bottom.

I think I mentioned before but Jeff is a master spritz gun shooter...he gets everything ready, then I sprinkle and decorate.  While he manages the in-and-out of the oven, I usually either scoop onto trays or put batches away.  It works great!

We also made a triple batch of peanut butter blossoms...about 30% of our guests can't eat peanuts but they are my favorites so I'm making them!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm also planning on making sour cream cutout cookies for New Years !