9 Holiday Baking Tips for Stress-free Baking

Holiday baking tips cover image with snowflake cutout cookies on cooling each. measuring spoons and cookie cutter

Hooray! It’s the happiest day of the year! December 1st!! That means it’s time for holiday baking. In the interest of flu disclosure, I’ve been holiday baking for weeks now. That’s how it gos when you have a food blog. But most people are just getting ready to kick off these baking season, and so I thought this would be the perfect time to share some holiday baking tips for stress-free baking. (Well, at least least stress.)

Don’t worry, these aren’t elaborate tips for how to decorate sugar cookies (still working on that myself) or whip up the perfect meringue. In fact, most of these holiday baking tips aren’t food-related at all (except one, but that’s a very important one). These are the practical things that will make your baking season go more smoothly and help keep you sane and be more productive during one of the busiest months of the year.

Christmas baking traditions

Christmas cookies

Before we jump into the holiday baking tips I thought I’d share some of my family’s holiday baking traditions. That way you can understand why I am as crazy as I am when it comes to Christmas cookies.

Baking Christmas cookies was always one of my favorite Christmas memories. In fact, it is one of my favorite childhood memories overall. When I was a child, I thought we made so many cookies! It felt like a season long escapade in the kitchen. In realty, it was only a few days. With about a half-dozen varieties of cookies. But what a fun few days it was!

Each year we made cut-out butter cookies filled with chocolate frosting (Istill use the same recipe today, minus the frosting), cookie gun (press or spritz) cookies (my mom had an electronic cookie gun that we used for years), Linzer tarts that later became jelly thumbprints, pecan balls, and rum balls. Each year there was usually one wildcard cookie that someone ripped out of a magazine. The best was a little chocolate cream-cheese tart that I am determined to recreate this year.

Compared to the fifteen or sixteen varieties of cookies I bake today, it doesn’t seem like a lot. But it was such a special time. And, of course, I always thought we made the best cookies.

Nut bread

The other big part of the baking season was nut bread. My dad wasn’t much of a baker, but once a year he donned an apron and spent the better part of a day in the kitchen whipping up two-dozen nut breads and a couple of poppyseed loaves.

He’d wake at dawn to make the bread in a giant black pot that I think was only used for nut bread. Then he’d grind the nuts–a combination of walnuts, pecans, and almonds. And spend hours rolling out what was to become our signature homemade gift for families and friends.

Then he’d head off to the American Legion Christmas tree lot and leave my mom to bake all those loaves all afternoon.

Of course, this in one tradition I have not continued. From the day my son was diagnosed with peanut and tree nut allergies, nuts were banished from my house. Today I’ve developed some food allergies too, and so it’s been years since I’ve tasted a piece of nut bread. But the smell and baking nut bread will always be synonymous with the holiday season.

Cakes

My mom was the cake lady. So we had cakes for every occasion. Including Christmas.

In fact, on Christmas we had two cakes. One for Christmas (a tree, bell, wreath), and one for my brother’s birthday. We never tried to substitute a Christmas cake for a birthday cake or vice versa. Here’s a bonus holiday baking tip for you: unless you are having a giant gathering you don’t need more than one cake on Christmas.

A new generation of holiday baking

When I got married and moved to Pennsylvania, my husband’s family was delighted to learn I was a baker. There weren’t many of them in the family and so cookies were a rare treat. Once we went to a big family dinner and there was no dessert. True story.

The first Christmas we were married, my husband’s grandmother, Babe (the kids called her Mimi), gave me a list of cookies she’d wanted me to make. It was a longest. And of course, nothing on the list matched my own family’s cookie list, so my baking list grew exponentially.

That year I baked for three weeks straight. I learned how to freeze cookies. I packaged dozens of tins for friends, family, and neighbors and made cookie trays for our employees, the nursing home, and Christmas parties.

And, as you might imagine, I loved every minute of it.

One year, I baked with a puppy underfoot. Another with a baby on my hip. And none of it fazed me. As long as carols played in the background, twinkle lights lit up the room, and the enticing aroma of freshly-baking cookies wafted from the oven I was happy.

Holiday baking after allergies

Back then, I still baked a lot with nuts. In addition to the Linzer tarts (almonds) and pecan balls, I also made peanut butter blossoms, buckeyes, pecan tassies, almond crusted lemon bars, oatmeal raisin cookies with walnuts, 7-layer bars, white chocolate macadamia nut cookies, and more!

Obviously, I had a lot of changes to make once nut became off limits.

At first, I just eliminated the nut cookies (or the nut ingredient like in the oatmeal raisins) and focused on the ones that were safe. Things were pretty simple: chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, butter cookies, gingerbread and chocolate cut-outs. It didn’t seem like enough (and yet, it was very similar to what we baked when I was a kid.)

As my son got older he started noticing all the cookie options available at holiday gatherings. And so I got creative. I found other nut-free cookies that would be fun to make. And then I started experimenting with some of my favorite recipes to make them nut free. Like the chocolate chip snowballs that are my nut free take on classic pecan snowballs.(This is a quick, easy cookie if you are new to holiday baking.)

Now, we have a huge list of must-bake cookies every Christmas. Want to see the list of everything I am baking this year? See it on Instagram.

I love having so many options for him. And I love a good cookie tray with a huge variety of pretty cookies.

But, all that baking takes time. And energy. And money! (Have you seen the price of butter?) Whether you plan to whip up a couple of batch of your favorite recipe or you are planning to have a cookie baking marathon, these holiday baking tips will help make sure your holiday baking goes smoothly.

Holiday Baking Tips

Make a holiday baking list. The first holiday holiday baking tip to make sure everything goes smoothly. is to plan ahead. Make a list of all the cookies and other goodies you plan to bake (muffins, pies, cakes, etc . . .). This list will help you manage ingredients and calendar time. It is your master list for holiday baking. For a HUGE nut free holiday baking list, check out my list.
Schedule baking sessions. Once you have a list of everything you plan to bake, get out your calendar. Be sure to record any and all important events first: Christmas parties, dinners, concerts, tree lightings, family visits, work, and other commitments. Look at the times you have open and set aside some of those slots for baking. I recommend tackling a lot of cookies at one time. One batch makes almost as big a mess as multiple batches. Once you’ve dragged out the flour sugar, baking soda and extracts you might as well knock as many recipes off your list as possible. This is one of my favorite holiday baking tips. Pro Holiday Baking Tip: Be strategic with your baking. If you have doughs that need to chill before rolling, make them first. And then use the chilling time to make other cookies. I also like to schedule like dough together. So I will bake all my chocolate cookies at one time. I’ll start with he most basic dough and then move up to the flavored ones or ones with more ingredients.
Inventory your ingredients. Before you can start baking you need to make sure you have everything you need. There is nothing more frustrating than being in the middle of a recipe and realizing you don’t have any eggs or powdered sugar. (Ask me how I know.) Often holiday baking recipes you don’t use much throughout the year (peppermint extract, molasses). See if you have any in your pantry or if you need to buy them. I use my holiday baking list to record how many sticks of butter and eggs I need and to get a rough idea of how many bags of dry ingredients. That way, I can be sure I am prepared before I am elbow-deep in dough.
Stock up on paper, wraps, and tins. You’ll also need various supplies to get you through holiday baking seasons. Make sure you have parchment paper, plastic wrap, foil, freezer bags, cookie sheets, cookie tins, cookie platters, etc . . . This makes freezing, storing, and gifting cookies so much easier.
Do a big shop. Once you know what you have, it’s time to gather the rest of the ingredients and supplies. I recommend buying everything at once. Nobody wants to go to the grocery store more than necesarry. Here’s a pro holiday baking tip for you: use Walmart pick-up or Instacart to have groceries delivered so you don’t even have to go into the store.
Start early. Holiday baking tip #__ is to start early. Honestly, the sooner the better. Like this weekend if possible. The further we get into December, the busier things get. (This is especially true if you have kids at home involved in sports or the arts)> Baking early is great because it means you always have baked goods on hand for impromptu holiday gatherings and it means you can relax and enjoy the holidays with friends and family.
Clean out your freezer. If you bake early – anytime between now and Dec. 20th, trust me when I tell you you don’t want to skip this next tip. Clean our your freezer. One of the great things about holiday cookies is so many of them freeze well. Especially when it’s only for a few weeks. But if you are a big-batch baker you will need lots of room in your freezer to store the goodies. So start now by cleaning out your freezer. Ditch those half-eaten and freezer-burned cartons of ice-cream. Plan meals around what’s in your freezer. It will free up space and save money. Toss anything older than 6 months or that just looks funky. (I always find cookies left from last Christmas.)
Plan simple meals for baking days. This holiday baking tip is a game-changer. Plan what you are going to eat on baking days in advance. And keep the meals simple. When I am baking I can go for hours without stopping to eat. But the rest of my family is always looking for food. (Pests). The last thing I want to do when my kitchen is covered with ten trays of cookies is whip up a meal. Plus, it’s likely that your oven will be occupied. Baking days are great nights for cock pot meals, grilled cheese, or even take-out. But having a plan is so important if you don’t want everyone to binge on your fresh-baked cookies.
Have fun. Put on some holiday music. Or turn on the Hallmark Channel in the background. Or maybe you love the old Christmas classics like Rudolph and Charlie Brown. Dig out your holiday apron. Switch to holiday towels. Holiday baking is supposed to be fun, so go ahead and make it festive.

There you have it, Nine holiday baking tips to make this holiday baking season merry and bright. And less stressful.

FREE Nut Free Cookie Guide

Are you still looking for some special nut free holiday cookies? Check out my Nut Free Cookie guide for 7 amazing recipes that are perfect for holiday baking!