Today is the start of the second annual 12 Weeks of Christmas Cookies bloghop. I again am joining other fabulous food bloggers around the net who will post a new cookie recipe every Friday for the next 12 weeks. I plan to post new cookie recipes, as well as a couple of my favorite cookie recipes that for some unknown reason I haven’t blogged about yet. Hopefully, we’ll end up with some great ideas and fabulous cookies to give away to friends and family for Christmas. I can’t believe Christmas is only 12 weeks away.

My first recipe comes from a cute little cookie cookbook, One Dough Fifty Cookies. I was the winner of a cookie contest hosted by the wonderful Jaime, of Sophistimon. (Thanks Jaime!) My prize was from Ice Box Bakery and included fun cookie baking accessories in addition to the cookbook. Ice Box Bakery sells premium all-natural cookie dough, ready to slice and bake. You can buy Ice Box Cookie dough at many locations, including Whole Foods in Utah.

The cookbook gives you a master cookie dough recipe that makes 12 to 20 dozen cookies. Then it gives you 50 recipes to use to change the basic butter cookie dough into nearly any type of cookie you’d like to make. You can make all the cookies at once, or you can freeze part of the dough and make different kinds of cookies later. This would be a great option if you are pressed for time but still want to make a wide variety of cookies.

I tried two of the recipes in the first section of the book, Spritz and Hand-Formed Cookies. The first cookie, Jelly Bowls, is a basic thumbprint cookie which used 1/2 of the Master Dough recipe and 3/4 cup of jam. I used my homemade peach and strawberry freezer jams.

The second recipe, Zesty Lime and Almond Sticks, was my favorite of the two. Both cookies are a crisp, crumbly and lightly sweet cookie, but I loved the added zip from the lime and the extra crunch from the almonds in the lime cookies. I added a white chocolate drizzle to dress them up a bit.

Zesty Lime Almond Sticks

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Ingredients

• 1 cup whole natural almonds
• 1/2 recipe Master Dough*
• 1 1/2 teaspoons freshly grated lime zest
• 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
• 3/4 cup confectioners' sugar
• 3 large egg whites, lightly beaten with 1/4 teaspoon salt

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350º. In a food processor, process the almonds until finely ground. (I used almond meal.)
2. In a large bowl, beat together the dough, lime zest, juice and 1/2 cup of the ground almonds with an electric mixer on medium speed until thoroughly combined.
3. Chill the dough, if necessary, until firm enough to roll.

Notes

*Or use your favorite butter cookie dough recipe. It would be fun to try it with Ice Box Bakery sugar cookie dough.

Be sure and check out all of the fabulous cookies the other 12 weeks of Christmas Cookies bakers baked up for this week. If you’d like to participate weekly in our 12 weeks of Christmas Cookies posts, we’d love to have you join us and add your cookie recipe links. April, http://abbysweets.blogspot.com/, is the group’s founder, you can contact her at aprilsattic at comcast dot net to join.