I love traditional cookie recipes at Christmastime. If you’re craving more nostalgic Christmas cookies, try my homemade Polish kolaczki, classic lemon thumbprint cookies, and these easy Danish butter cookies.
Make the cookie dough. First, you’ll prepare a simple shortbread cookie dough, wrap it in plastic wrap, and pop it into the fridge to chill for an hour. Roll and cut out the cookies. Now, take out the dough and roll it out to ¼” thickness. Use a cookie cutter or biscuit cutter to cut out the dough into 2” rounds. Then, cut a small hole or shape in the center of one-half of the rounds. These will be the tops of your Linzer cookies. Chill. Arrange the cut-out cookie dough on a lined baking sheet. Place the whole thing into the freezer while the oven preheats. Bake. Afterward, bake the cookies at 350ºF for 18-10 minutes. Finally, cool the cookies on a wire rack. Assemble. Line up your solid cookies (without the holes in the centers). Spoon jam preserves over each cookie, and gently press a top cookie over the filling to make a sandwich. Once your Linzer cookies are all assembled, dust the tops with powdered sugar, and enjoy!
Why I Love This Linzer Cookie RecipeWhat Are Linzer Cookies?Ingredients You’ll NeedHow to Make Linzer CookiesRecipe Tips and VariationsWant to Make Ahead?Storing and Freezing Linzer CookiesMore Christmas Cookie RecipesGet the Recipe
Festive. Linzer cookies are so pretty! They’re delicate shortbread cookies filled with colorful fruit preserves, topped with a snowy, powdered sugar finish. They look great on a cookie plate next to more treats like sugar cookies, classic rugelach, and peanut butter balls. Sweet and soft. Biting into a Linzer cookie is always super satisfying. I love the contrast of the crisp, buttery shortbread against the sweet and soft fruit jelly filling. Easy ingredients. Even though they look impressive on a dessert table, this is one of my easiest holiday cookie recipes. You can count the ingredients on one hand. Adaptable. Linzer cookies are so much fun to make and adapt with different jams and flavors. I change up the filling, add citrus zest, or use flavoring extracts to customize these Christmas cookies in any way that I like.
Butter – Brought to room temperature. I like to bake with salted butter, but unsalted butter is perfectly fine, too. Sugar – Granulated sugar works best in shortbread cookie recipes. You could also use light brown sugar like I use for my brown sugar cut-out cookies. Vanilla – You could also substitute vanilla extract with almond extract for almond cookies. Flour and Salt – Classic Linzer cookie recipes call for almond flour, but I like to use all-purpose for convenience’s sake. I also prefer the texture. If you’d rather use almond flour in your Linzer cookies (like in a traditional torte), consider using ¾ cup of almond flour per 1 cup of regular flour. Fruit Preserves – I like to use raspberry or strawberry preserves, but you can fill these Linzer cookies with any jam or fruit filling you’d like. Other good choices are black currant, peach or apricot jam, cherry, and fig preserves. See the Tips section later on for more easy variations. Powdered Sugar – Also called icing sugar or confectioner’s sugar, for dusting over the sandwich cookies.
You’ll also sign up to get new recipes in your inbox. Δ
