Day Two of the 12 Days of Global Cookies –
Spumoni Cookie Recipe
It’s cookie season!! Day Three is an Italian cookie recipe – Spumoni Cookies! These cookies borrow the flavors of cherry, pistachio, and chocolate from the traditional molded gelato dessert.
When I start to put together the recipes for my holiday baking, I try to make sure that I have a variety of flavors, textures, colors and shapes. It makes the finished tray (or box, since my cookies will be boxed and dropped off to people this year) look more appealing.
This year I'm making an extra effort to make sure that the cookies in my boxes are inspired by recipes from around the world. A blog called Global Bakes can't just serve up chocolate chip cookies, right??
(There is absolutely nothing wrong with chocolate chip cookies - they are one of my favorites! But variety is the spice of life!)
What is Spumoni?
Actually, Spumoni is an Italian dessert that made of three flavors of gelato - cherry, pistachio, and either chocolate or vanilla. The gelato is layered and molded and then cut like a cake.
The flavors of Spumoni compliment each other so well that I just had to steal them for a cookie!
Now, there are a ton of Italian cookie recipes out there and I will be making some of them soon! But this Spumoni cookie just had to find it's way into my holiday baking this year.
One of the main reasons for that is because my husband loves all things cherry. And according to him, the cherry part of this cookie 'slaps'!
That's good, right? I mean, my kids tell me that it is so I'll go with that.
Luckily my husband didn't just eat the cherry parts because he said the whole cookie was delicious!
How to make Spumoni Cookies
This Italian cookie recipe comes together so easily. It is as simple as making a batch of sugar cookies (basically), splitting the dough into three bowls and flavoring them separately.
I used alcohol in two of the doughs - Amaretto in the pistachio dough and Kirsch in the cherry dough. The alcohol is completely optional. I really like the flavor that the two bring to the cookie but you can use extracts, food grade oils or just leave them out. The cookie will still taste amazing!
There a couple of ways that you could roll these doughs together and I will experiment with several and post updates here.
From my husbands response, it is clear that I will be making these often!
I chose to simply roll the dough into ropes and then lay them side by side. To get the doughs to stay together, I found that using my finger to brush on some water helped the doughs to stick together better.
Next, roll the dough out as one piece and then slice into finger shaped cookies.
Now just transfer to a baking sheet and chill briefly. You could bake right away after rolling but chilling will help them keep their straight shape.
12 Days of Cookies, Global Edition!
Check out the other cookie recipes that will be on my cookie tray this year:
Day One – Brown Butter Snickerdoodles
Day Two – Mint Brigadeiro
Day Three – Spumoni Cookies
Day Four – Classic Linzer Cookies
Day Five – Gingerbread Cookies
Day Six – Chinese Almond Cookies
Day Seven – Orange Cardamom Shortbread Cookies
Day Eight – Russian Pryaniki, still perfecting this recipe!
Day Nine – Ginger Cookies
Day Ten – Japanese Pocky modified for The NYT Cooking Recipe
Day Eleven – Plum Ginger Rugelach
Day Twelve – Alfajores
Extra! – Buckeyes aka Peanut Butter Balls
If you need some cute tags to tie you treat bags full of cookies, download these and print them at home!
Spumoni Cookies
36
servings25
minutes10
minutesIngredients
226 grams (1 cup) unsalted butter
200 grams (1 cup) granulated sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
310 grams (2 ½ cups) all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon baking powder
- For the Cherry Dough
¼ cup Maraschino Cherries, dried and finely chopped
1 Tablespoon Kirsch (optional)
1-2 drops pink gel coloring
- For the Pistachio Dough
¼ cup pistachios, shelled and finely chopped
1 Tablespoon Amaretto OR ½ teaspoon almond extract
1- 2 drops green gel coloring
- For the Chocolate Dough
28 grams (1 ounce) chocolate chips, melted
Directions
- In a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, cream together the butter and the sugar for about 2 minutes.
- Add the egg and the vanilla and mix until combined.
- In a separate bowl, combine the flour, salt and baking powder. Whisk together to mix well.
- Add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture and mix just until combined.
- Divide the dough into thirds and place in separate bowls. (I weighed my dough and ended up with 750 grams total. I divided this into 250 grams in each bowl. You don't have to weigh though! You can absolutely eyeball this!)
- In one bowl, add the pistachios, the Amaretto OR almond extract, and the green food coloring. Mix well to combine. Wear gloves to keep from staining your hands! Set aside.
- In the second bowl, add the cherries, Kirsch (if using) and red food coloring. Mi well to combine. Set aside.
- In the third bowl, add the melted chocolate and mix well to combine.
- On a floured countertop, or on parchment or silpat, roll each colored dough into a long rope. Place side by side and rub a little water on the sides where they meet to help the dough stick together.
- Using a rolling pin, roll the three colors out to about ¼ inch thick. With a knife or rotary cutter, slice pieces that are approximately 1 inch wide. Transfer to 2 parchment lined baking sheets. Refrigerate until the oven comes up to temperature.
- Preheat oven to 375F.
- Bake for 10 minutes or until lightly browned on the edges. Allow to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack and cool completely. Store airtight at room temperature for up to 5 days.
Notes
- This dough freezes well if you prepare it and then wrap each color individually in cling film. Then store in a freezer bag in the freezer for up to 3 months. You can also freeze the baked cookies after wrapping them well in clingfilm.
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