Easy Christmas desserts & cookie recipes for kids

Candy Cane Cookies

Here's another Christmas staple...candy canes! Now you can make your own candy cane cookies at home.

Ingredients:

• 226 g / 1 cup of butter (room temperature)
• 210 g / 1 cup of sugar (2/5 tsp for decoration)
• ½ tsp vanilla extract
• ½ tsp baking powder
• 1 egg
• 350 g / 2 3/4 cups of flour
• Colorant (food coloring, or use beet juice concentrate or spinach juice concentrate for an all-natural option!)

This recipe involves twisting and turning, so buckle up! But don’t worry…it’s a lot easier than it sounds. First, get a big mixing bowl and have your little one stir the butter in with the sugar. Once they’re combined, use your hand mixer and mix until it’s fluffy. Your kid can measure all of the rest of the ingredients except for the flour and the colorant, and add that to the mix. Get a big wooden spoon and recruit your kid to stir. Slowly add the flour and continue to mix. Once the flour is at a consistency that it doesn’t stick to your hand, divide it in half. Get one of the pieces and add red or green food coloring to it. Start with just a few drops, then add as you go until your kiddo approves of the color. Have your little one knead the dough until the coloring has been fully incorporated into the dough. Cover the dough pieces with clean plastic wrap and let rest in the fridge.

For best results, the dough must not be too tough or too soft. Once you have rested the dough enough (half an hour will do but no more than two hours), break apart pieces that are the size of walnuts from both of the dough balls. Now comes the twisting and turning part! Roll these pieces into a ball first, and then into 10-cm long “snakes”. Twist the two colors, and cut the ends and turn the end like a candy cane. Lay these pieces onto a baking sheet and sprinkle some sugar on them. Bake for 10-12 minutes at 180C / 350F, until they are golden brown at the bottom Once they are cooled, they’re ready to eat or wrap up as gifts! These are the cutest Christmas cookies for kids (and kids at heart) to enjoy!

Christmas desserts for kids

If you’d like to branch out from the cookies, we’ve got some other dessert options too! Here are some deliciously fun Christmas desserts to make with kids.

Snowman Hot Chocolate

This recipe will warm your heart in the most chocolatey way possible, and it involves a snowman! What’s not to love?

Ingredients for hot chocolate:

• 250 ml milk
• 16 g / ⅛ cup of cocoa powder
• 60 ml / ¼ cup of hot water
• 2 ml / ¼ tsp of vanilla extract
• A pinch of salt

Ingredients for snowmen:

• 3 regular sized marshmallows
• Melted chocolate
• Orange jelly bean or carrots for the nose
• Chocolate crackers or pretzels

Let’s dive into the hot chocolate first…it’s pretty straightforward! Have your kiddo measure and put the cocoa powder, sugar, and salt in a pot and mix. Then, add hot water and simmer. Once it’s had some time to simmer, add the milk. Take it off the heat before the hot chocolate boils. Add the vanilla extract and mix until it foams a bit.

Take the melted chocolate into a pastry bag. Squeeze a bit in between the three marshmallows. Stick two chocolate crackers or pretzels on the sides of the middle marshmallow to make the arms. Once this is done, use the melted chocolate to make the buttons and eyes of the snowman. Lastly, stick the jelly bean in as a nose. There you have it! When you are ready to enjoy this delicious mixture, put the snowman into the cup full of hot chocolate. Enjoy!

Christmas Pretzels

Savory meets sweet. These will be your kid's favorite!

Ingredients:

• Melted chocolates of Christmas colors like red, white, milk chocolate, green
• Christmas sprinkles
• Pretzel rods and pretzels

Put Christmas sprinkles into different containers. Get your chocolate and melt it either in the microwave or in a heat-safe bowl over boiling water without the bowl touching the boiling water. Recruit your kid to dip the pretzels into the melted chocolate first and then the Christmas sprinkles. Or, put the chocolate into a pastry bag and have your kid decorate the pretzels with crazy designs! With a little added Christmas sprinkle magic, you’ll have amazing desserts.

Santa Cheesecake

These mini Santa cheesecakes will be the talk of your kiddo all year round. With your help, they will be able to easily make this cheesecake from scratch and it’s delicious, too!

Ingredients:

• 1 bag of chocolate desserts cups
• 227 g / 1 cup of softened cream cheese
• 32 g / ¼ cup of confectioner’s sugar
• 160 g / 2/3 cup heavy cream
• 2 ml / ¼ tsp vanilla extract
• 1 bag of cheesecake pudding mix
• 12-15 strawberries

Have your kid wash the strawberries nice and clean, pick the stalks off, and give them a paper towel to dry them off. Then, put together everything in a pot, except for the strawberries and chocolate cups. On medium heat, whisk the mixture until it’s fluffy. Put this mixture into a pastry bag and cut the tip of the bag. Now, a little precision is needed, so you might want to help your kid out a bit. First, squeeze a bit of the cream into the middle of the chocolate cups, and fill in the sides. Put the strawberries with their tips facing up. Then, put a little cream on top. You can put little sprinkles to decorate and voila! You’ve got the cutest cheesecake desserts all set for Christms dinner.

Christmas Marshmallow Pops

So easy, so delicious…your kid will want to make these all year round! It’s a deliciously addictive (totally not in a bad way) Christmas snack recipe for kids.

Ingredients:

• 1 bag of marshmallows
• 3 bars of chocolate
• Popsicle sticks

Decorations of your choosing, such as:

• Chocolate chips
• Sprinkles
• Candy eyeballs
• Twisty pretzels

Have your kiddo stick the marshmallows into the popsicle sticks. Melt the chocolates in a heat-safe bowl on a pot with boiling water. Dunk the marshmallows on sticks into the chocolate. The decorations are up to your kid’s imagination! You can cover the marshmallows with chocolate chips or sprinkles, and put crazy candy eyes on them. The sky's the limit! This is one of the most fun Christmas desserts for kids to try out.