Ugly Christmas Sweater Cookies are delicious, buttery, crispy sugar cookies decorated with ugly sweater designs that are sure to be winners at all your holiday gatherings! Try my Sugar Cookie Recipe for another cookie recipe easy to bake and decorate!
Ugly Christmas Sweater Cookie
This is the home of the ORIGINAL Ugly Sweater Christmas Cookie!! If you are looking for THAT sugar cookie… the one that is the perfect combination of sweetness, buttery crispness, and that goes perfectly with piping glaze… this is that cookie. It has won awards and has been a part of more cookie exchanges than I can count! It never fails to get praise and folks are always asking for the recipe!
How to Make Ugly Christmas Sweater Cookies
The image above is my ‘busy” ugly Christmas sweater. I am most certainly not saying it is based on anything in my closet…But, to get decorating, you have to get the cookies made first! The design is up to you.
To make the cookies, get out your stand mixer to get started. Do not preheat the oven right away; the dough has to chill for at least an hour before baking the cookies.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream together the butter and sugar until well combined (about 2 minutes).
- With the mixer on low, add in the eggs and egg yolks.
- Turn off the mixer and scrape the sides of the bowl.
- With the mixer back on low, add the vanilla and almond extract.
- In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, salt, and baking powder.
- Mix in the flour mixture about a cup at a time until fully incorporated.
- Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour. (This might be a good time to check your closet for any ‘ugly sweater’ ideas or designs!)
Below is my ‘weird-eyed Rudolf with a red nose that sticks out way too far and is covered with gravy and mashed potatoes by the end of the night’ ugly Christmas sweater. Again, these are not similar to anything that might currently reside in my home…
Baking and Decorating the Cookies
After the dough has chilled for at least an hour, preheat the oven to 350°F. Roll the dough out onto a floured surface. Cut out the dough into your sweater shape (I made mine as large as my hand, but you could also use a sweater cookie cutter). Bake for 6-8 minutes, watching them carefully so you don’t burn the edges.
Let the cookies cool on the cookie sheet until they are firm enough to transfer to a cooling rack. When you are ready to decorate the cookies, I recommend using my favorite glaze icing to decorate them. It’s so much better than royal icing! Have fun using your imagination, and Merry Christmas!
Ugly Christmas Sweater Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups (3 sticks or 340g) unsalted butter, room temperature
- 2 cups (400g) granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 2 large egg yolks
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 2 teaspoons almond extract
- 4 cups (500g) all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
Instructions
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream together the butter and sugar until well combined (about 2 minutes).
- With the mixer on low, add in the eggs and egg yolks, mixing until well incorporated.
- Turn off the mixer and scrape the sides of the bowl.
- With the mixer back on low, add the vanilla and almond extract.
- In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, salt, and baking powder.
- Mix the flour mixture in with the butter mixture about a cup at a time until fully incorporated. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour.
- When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 350°F.
- Roll the dough out onto a floured surface.
- Cut out the dough into your sweater shape (I made mine as large as my hand, but you could also use a sweater cookie cutter).
- Bake for 6-8 minutes, watching them carefully so you don't burn the edges.
- Let the cookies cool on the cookie sheet until they are firm enough to transfer to a cooling rack. Have fun decorating!
Did you make this recipe?
Thank you for making my recipe! You took pictures, right? Well go ahead and post them on Instagram! Be sure to mention me @iambaker and use the hashtag #YouAreBaker.
Those look amazing! I tried to make them at home using a cookie cutter but the cookies ballooned up. Any suggestions on where I went wrong? Thanks!
Oh my gosh! The cookies are adorable and I’ve now gone and ordered a sweater cookie cutter. I know what I’ll be giving away for some of my gifts this year. Thanks for the inspiration.
Your recipes sound delicious. Will try them soon. Definitely will follow you from now on. Thank you for printing out all these goodies.
Hello-I’m going to be making these Ugly Christmas Cookies at a Senior place for the residents. Could you tell me how you did the frosting for these Ugly cookies? would be very much appreciated.
Is there a reason why you use the unsalted butter?
I add 2 oz. Cream cheese and it makes these cookies even better! These are my all time favorite!
Great idea!!
Hey Amanda I made these cookies last year and they turned out awesome…I love all of your recipes that I’ve tried… last year when I made this recipe I thought it called for 5 cups of flour…however I don’t totally trust my memory so I just mixed it up with the 4 cups of flour as this recipe calls for and the dough was too sticky so I added 1 more cup and the dough was definitely the consistency for cookies….so was wondering if that was a typo since you’ve done some updating on your site? Just didn’t want a new baker to get discouraged….Thanks for all your wonderful recipes
Omg these are too cute to be ugly! 🥰
I can’t find your icing recipe I really want to try my hand at sugar cookies and icing like yours thank you
How thick do you roll the dough?
I am just wondering if the cookie dough spreads in the oven and shape is not good any more ???????? Want to get started on my annual cookie making journey!!!!! Thank you