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Welcome to the Baker’s Dozen Ultimate Christmas Cookie Exchange! Today I’ve united with twelve incredible food bloggers to bring you a holiday cookie celebration. To see all of the participating bloggers, please visit the Baker’s Dozen home site at www.13CookieChristmas.info.
I’ve spouted off before about how I think that Christmas cookies should LOOK like Christmas cookies. Red Velvet is one of my favorite flavors, and I always seem to turn to Red Velvet when I’m looking for something super festive-looking for the holidays. I had never made a red velvet cookie before though, so I did a little investigating and decided to bake Red Velvet Shortbread Cookies.
I used red gel paste for my coloring (I may have overdone it a little, but I wanted them to be red!) Gel paste is more concentrated than liquid food coloring and it doesn’t impart flavor to your baked product the way that liquid coloring sometimes does. 
They’re not really a fussy cookie, but I think you’ll have the best results if you prepare the dough in a food processor. Let the blades do the work with mixing, and your dough will come together nicely and be ready for rolling.
These are a shortbread cookie… thin and crisp. They’re half dipped into white chocolate and then edged with a festive sprinkle. You could also edge them with chopped pistachios if you wished to have the red/green look.
I was shooting to create a cookie that would be pretty and perfect for Christmas. How’d I do?
The chocolate sets up after cooling, and then they’re fine to store. Mine have been in the freezer now for a couple of weeks and they’re still perfectly fine. Just place waxed paper between layers and store in a covered container until you’re ready to break them out for the holidays. In my opinion, these are a wonderfully festive cookie with an okay flavor. The red velvet flavor doesn’t come through as much as in a cake, and the white chocolate dip is a must both for flavor and for holiday pizzazz 
I’ll be happy to add them to my gift boxes as they’re a bit of a WOW cookie in terms of decor, don’tcha think?
This recipe can be found HERE.
Visit the Baker’s Dozen site at www.13CookieChristmas.info to see who else is participating in the Cookie Exchange.
I’m also contributing this cookie recipe to the Virtual Cookie Jar for the 12 Days of Sharing, hosted by In Jennie’s Kitchen! Share Our Strength is an organization that is fighting to end childhood hunger. By sharing a favorite cookie recipe, you can all help raise awareness about childhood hunger and help to end childhood hunger by 2015. A small donation can go far. $25 can feed a child three healthy meals a day for a month (via Share Our Strength site).
How you can help:
1. Make a donation to Share Our Strength by clicking on the banner above! Not only will you be helping to end childhood hunger in America, you’ll also be entered in a giveaway for some really great prizes (including a Cuisinart stand mixer)!
2. Join in the fun by posting your favorite cookie recipe and adding it to the virtual cookie jar. Be sure to encourage your readers to join in and consider making a donation! (Click here for posting details…)
3. Keep visiting In Jennie’s Kitchen for featured recipes and participating blogs as well as all of the tasty additions to the virtual cookie jar!
4. Spread the word! Be sure to tell all of your friends and family about the 12 Days of Sharing and encourage them to participate. Consider donating a few of your tweets and status updates to the 12 Days of Sharing to spread the word on Facebook and Twitter!
43 Comments
I’d say you did a magnificent job of capturing the spirit of the holidays through these cookies – they are gorgeous!
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These look delicious! Adding them to my list…
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These really do look festive!!!
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Beautiful!
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Yum, I love anything red velvet this time of year!
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Stunning! Never thought to do a red velvet cookie–what a great idea!
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Genius, love the color. The only part I dislike is that I didn’t get to try one.
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those look wonderful!S
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Standing ovation! These are really gorgeous Lori, bravo!
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These are absolutely beautiful. Not too beautiful that I don’t want to eat them. Because I want to eat them. Here is my address for shipping…
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Oooh, so pretty, Lori!
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I definitely agree with you – these cookies really looking like Christmas! Love the color you achieved
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Those are the cutest cookies ever! Great recipe Lori and your pictures are fantastic!
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They are gorgeous! The perfect cookie for Christmas!
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SO creative! I bet they taste as good as they look! They’d be perfect with a glass of egg nog!
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What a great idea! I love these!
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They’re very pretty and festive looking. Thanks for the virtual cookie jar info.
~ingrid
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Wow – those look like perfection!!! I do have a cookie exchange to attend this weekend so I’m bookmarking these!
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Oh! Very festive! I love them!!!
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Incredible, I really love the idea of crossing cookies with red velvet cake. Fantastic for Christmas!
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red velvet cookies are new to me, these look great and very festive for Christmas
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These are just beautiful and so very festive. They would be just beautiful in a cookie box or on a cookie tray. I really like that the freeze well – that’s really the only way to go for holiday cookies. I totally agree on the gel paste for food coloring – it’s the only way to not muck with the recipe. Thanks so much for sharing.
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Red velvet cake in a portable cookie form? Yes, please!
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I’ve always wanted to try red velvet something! Love these cookies! Such fun and so very festive.
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I can’t get over the beautiful color. I love Share Our Strength, great cause to support.
Mimi
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Wow, beautiful cookie. I will check out the other sites.
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Your cookies are gorgeous!
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Yum! Love these cookies… they look beautiful! Just like Christmas on a plate.
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I think the red is just right! They are beautiful Lori. Makes me want to make them for tree ornaments!
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Now that’s a beautiful cookie!
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You did it Lori—these scream Christmas! They look so beautiful and thanks for participating in the 12 Days of Cookies. I”m adding these to my holiday baking next week.
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this will be a great add to my tray of treats. they definitely DO have that WOW factor…BUT i need help with dipping white chocolate. yours looks so perfect!. do you have any tips? good chocolate?…more veg. oil? if you can…please help. mine is always too thick to get that perfect dipped look.
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These look awesome! Wish I had time to make them for a party I’m having tomorrow! May have to try them for some cookie giveaway plates!
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Wow! What a great idea and a beautiful cookie. These must taste like heaven!
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I’d say those cookies are absolutely cover worthy:)
Thanks for sharing, Lori
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I love these! I think you accomplished your goal!
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I love red velvet cake and we are having red velvet cupcakes for our wedding so definitelt going to have to make abtach of these. thanks for sharing this recipe.
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Oh going to have to make some of these, they are just too pretty to pass up.
Thanks for sharing
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Yum yum these look great! So festive! Btw, I love that ‘cut, bake, dip, sprinkle’ picture!
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This looks absolutely AMAZING and so so so perfect! Congratulations!
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I made this, they tasted ok — REALLY crisp — how do you know if you over bake them? also, my white chocolate turned off white! Was that because the cookie color changed it or from the heat? I added a bit of paraffin wax to the chocolate for consistency – but the chocolate had already turned off white by then….
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I made these and they were a huge hit. They were very crisp (I prefer thick and chewy) but they were an absolute HIT at work and all my co-workers LOVED them! The addition of them being dipped in white chocolate actually was a nice contrast to the crisp cookie. And VERY festive I might add! I will be making them again next year!
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i`m really into baking anything related to red velvet .. i`m famous 4 my red velvet cupcakes and red velvet bites ! i`m just wondering if the cookies r sweet enough ?? cuz the sugar is kinda little !
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Lori Lange Reply:
March 28th, 2010 at 10:03 AM
Noor- shortbread cookies in general aren’t very sweet. These are a little different. Not so much red-velvet tasting… more of the color than anything.
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