411 sugar cookie recipes

Maple pecan balls are buttery brown sugar cookies infused with maple extract and rolled around chopped pecans, each topped with a toasted pecan half. Tender, nutty, and built for holiday tins.

Chocolate chip pecan cookies made with golden shortening and brown sugar for a chewy center and crispy edge. Big, bakery-style drop cookies that spread wide and stay soft inside.

Peek-A-Bows are lace cookies made with corn syrup, brown sugar, and finely chopped nuts, rolled into cylinders while warm and tied with ribbon for a festive gift cookie.

Honey queen kisses drop cookies with a full cup of honey, butterscotch chips, flaked coconut, and crisp rice cereal for crunch. A chewy, crunchy, golden cookie with no refined sugar.

Pecan fingers with a buttery shortbread base and a chewy brown sugar pecan topping, dusted with powdered sugar. Two-layer bar cookies made entirely in the microwave.

Mazurka cookie bars with an almond shortbread base topped with a fruity filling of apricots, figs, raisins, walnuts, and candied orange peel, finished with powdered sugar icing.

Christmas ornament cookies are sturdy rolled sugar cookies cut into large bauble shapes and pierced with a hanging hole. Bake, decorate, and hang on the tree as edible ornaments or gift tags.

Secret kiss cookies hide a whole chocolate kiss inside a buttery, walnut-flecked shortbread, baked until just set and rolled in powdered sugar. Bite in and the soft chocolate center is the surprise. A Christmas cookie tin favorite.

A Weight Watchers-friendly oatmeal cookie made with banana, chunky peanut butter, raisins, and cinnamon. No added sugar, low-fat, and diabetic-friendly. Makes 2 big soft cookies in 15 minutes.

Lacy, crisp pecan cookies made with just 5 ingredients: egg white, brown sugar, flour, salt, and chopped pecans. A dainty, old-fashioned tea party cookie that bakes in 10 minutes flat.

White chocolate nut cookies with hand-chopped white chocolate chunks and mixed nuts in a brown sugar dough. A big-batch drop cookie with crisp edges and a chewy, buttery center.

Lucky chocolate chewies, soft brown sugar cocoa cookies studded with semisweet chips and topped with a vanilla glaze. Two dozen cookies in 30 minutes, the kind that vanish before they cool.

Bizcochos are traditional New Mexican holiday cookies creamed with lard, scented with orange zest, baked golden, then rolled in cinnamon sugar. The state cookie of New Mexico for Christmas and weddings.

Chunky peanut butter cookies rolled in sugar and pressed with a fork. A big-batch recipe with both white and brown sugar for crispy edges and chewy centers.

Raisin cookies use a boiled-water cooking method that plumps the raisins into the sweet brown sugar syrup before baking. No eggs, no butter required. Frugal Depression-era cookie that still satisfies.

Rich cookies made with leftover egg yolks from angel food cake: cream both sugars with shortening, roll in sugar, flatten with glass, and bake until golden for tender rounds.