To Make Cute Christmas Tree Cookies, Grab Your Piping Bag

If you're looking for a fun festive holiday baking project, novelty cookies are ideal. You could give Christmas cookies a fast food-inspired upgrade by cutting them into cute strips like french fries. Or to really get into the holiday spirit, make them in the shape of Christmas trees. And before you turn to a novelty cookie cutter, there's another way to give them an even more beautiful Christmas tree shape: Use a piping bag to shape your dough.

Choose a rich Danish butter cookie dough, which is similar to shortbread, to make the sweet treats feel even more festive. Once you've mixed the dough, divide it into two bowls, then add some color to make the cookies extra-pretty. Use cocoa powder or brown gel food color for the trunk portion, and either green gel color or matcha green tea powder for the larger tree portion. If you're using gel colors, you only need a little for a vibrant hue, and keep in mind that the color may continue to deepen as the mixture rests.

When piping, use a large star tip for the trees — simply start at the top and move it side-to-side getting wider towards the bottom to make a triangle. Then use a small star tip to pipe a brown trunk at the bottom of each. Pipe the shapes onto a parchment-lined baking sheet to stop them sticking. Once they've been baked for around 15 minutes, let them cool before decorating.

No Christmas tree is complete without colorful decorations, and these cute cookies are no exception. It's a chance to get creative, and there are a number of different ways to embellish the festive treats. Since the trees are already the right color with a lovely texture from the piping bag technique, it's not necessary to completely cover them in traditional icing as you might with regular plain cookies made with a cutter. Instead, simply apply your baubles, bows, or other decorations by hand.

A great way to get add-ons such as sprinkles to stick to the cookies is to use white candy melts as a glue — they melt quickly and evenly, and you don't have to go through the daunting process of tempering chocolate. Just melt them in short bursts using the microwave until the mixture is the right consistency for piping. Scatter sanding sugar, sprinkles, or edible glitter onto the candy glue in ribbon-like stripes for a colorful result, or dip them if it's easier.

You could use icing in a piping bag to make extra decorations such as stars, snowflakes, or poinsettia if you're feeling ambitious. Otherwise, stick edible candies onto the cookies using the white candy melt; tweezers can help produce a more precise result. The finished cookies will keep for several days in an airtight container – and if you're leaving cookies out for Santa, these ones are bound to impress.