I’m pleased to share these Candy Cane Kiss Cookies with you because they’re my favorite holiday cookie recipe of all time! Watch the short video showing you how to make these cookies, then scroll to the bottom of this post and print out the recipe so you can bake them at home.
Candy Cane Kiss Cookies
You’ll want to print out this recipe and save it for the holidays. Candy Cane Kiss Cookies are the best Christmas cookie recipe!
When the fall holidays arrive, the Candy Cane Kisses begin to appear on supermarket shelves too. These are an incredibly delicious flavor delivered by the Hershey’s Kisses people. And they’re amazing tucked into a cookie too.
Hershey’s Candy Cane Kisses
I love these things. I mean truly love these. They’re addicting, and they shouldn’t be purchased unless you plan to share… or bake Candy Cane Kiss Cookies.
These Candy Cane Kisses can be found during the fall/winter holidays at Target or drug stores and some grocery stores too. They’re amazing little treats. And I love them. Have I mentioned that?
These delightful little kiss cookies have some of those Candy Cane Kisses chopped up and incorporated into the cookie itself.
How to Make Candy Cane Kiss Cookies
The pepperminty cookie dough is rolled into balls and then tossed in a little bit of granulated sugar.
And the baked cookies are topped while warm with a Candy Cane Kiss. Then they’re placed into the refrigerator or freezer to set the chocolate so it doesn’t melt into the cookie. They’re such a pretty cookie for the holidays.
The Best Christmas Cookie Recipe
Candy Cane Kiss Cookies are good make-ahead cookies. They freeze well… so you can take them out for cookie platters when you’re ready for plating, or just take them out of the freezer and chow-down on Christmas treats when the mood happens to strike.
I believe they’re the best Christmas cookie recipe because they’ve been the number one favorite on my holiday cookie platters every year for the last ten years now!
When my son was little, he used to think these cookies were a good one to leave out for Santa, along with a glass of milk and a carrot for Rudolph.
You must find these specialty Kisses this holiday season and try them, and then definitely make some Candy Cane Kiss Cookies too!
If you’re looking for more festive cookie recipes for the holidays, you might also like to try my Chocolate Mint Wafers or these Holiday Nuggets. Christmas Crinkle Cookies, Molasses Honey Ginger Cookies and Gingerbread Christmas Tree Cookies are lovely holiday cookies too!
Candy Cane Kiss Cookies
Ingredients
- 1½ cups powdered sugar
- 1¼ cups (2½ sticks) butter, at room temperature
- 1 large egg
- 1 teaspoon peppermint extract (optional- see recipe notes)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3 cups all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup finely chopped Hershey's Candy Cane Kisses
- granulated white sugar
- 30 unwrapped Hershey's Candy Cane Kisses
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Make room in either the refrigerator or freezer for your cookie sheet.
- In a large mixer bowl, use an electric mixer to combine the powdered sugar, butter, egg and extracts. Beat at medium speed, scraping the bowl often until creamy (2 to 3 minutes). In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture and beat, scraping bowl often until well blended (1 to 2 minutes). The mixture will be a bit crumbly. Stir in the chopped Kisses.
- Shape the dough into 3/4-inch to 1-inch balls; roll in sugar. Place 1-inch apart on cookie sheet. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until set. As soon as they come out of the oven, press a Candy Cane Kiss into the center of each cookie. They'll crack a little around the edges, so just use your fingers to kind of hold the cookie together while you set the kiss inside. Put cookie sheet (with cookies) immediately into the freezer (preferred) or refrigerator so that the Kisses will set quickly. As soon as you press them into the cookie, they will begin to soften... so if you can get them into the freezer then they will keep their Kiss shape.
- Store in a covered container- at room temperature for up to a week. In the freezer they should be okay for a couple of weeks.
Notes
- *The addition of peppermint extract is completely optional. The cookie gets plenty of peppermint flavor from the addition of the chopped kisses, but if you’d like it really minty then go ahead and add the peppermint extract.
- *I’ve spotted these Kisses at Target and CVS Pharmacy.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I love that it’s speckled throughout the dough too. Such delicious cookies!
I made these today! They’re so cute! I agree they don’t need peppermint extract, perfectly minty without.
My only question is, my dough was perfert but when they were cooked the cookie part was a bit dry. Still very good but on the dry side. Do you think a bit more butter in the dough or cooking for less time would help? Thanks!
With dry dough, adding a little milk or whipping cream can help pull it together.
These look great! I saw the kisses at Target just a couple days ago, Definitely going to try this before Christmas! I was wondering if i could crush up candy canes and sprinkle them on the cookie?
Just tried these – not sure if the came out right (they look good though). The bottoms never brownd and the section on the underside of the kiss looks and tastes undercooked. I cooked for the full 12 minutes and confirmed oven temp. I put them back in for another 7! minutes and nothing changed. Still white with an undercooked underside. Also the recipe made more like 48 so I didn’t have enough kisses. I double checked all ingredients. Not sure what happened.
Can you use GF all purpose flour with this recipe. Also any high altitude tips?
I haven’t tried to sub GF flour in this recipe yet. Here is a great website to refer to for high altitude baking tips: http://www.mountainmamacooks.com/high-altitude/
These came out great! They were delicious, although the rush to put in the kisses and get them in the freezer was a little hard. The consistency of the dough was very easy to work with. The cookies are in the freezer now; I’m really hoping the kisses won’t melt.
These are great cookies! I bought the kisses and stored them in the freezer until they needed to be pressed into the cookies and then put the pan in the freezer. I had no issues with melting. My only concern was that at 12 mins they seemed way, way too soft. Did anyone else have this issues? I left them in for 14 mins, but I am wondering if I slightly over baked them.
I’ve never seen these kisses before o.o. I hope can find them in our supermarket they are so cute.
These are seriously one of the best I’ve EVER eaten. DEF add the peppermint extract and instead of chopped kisses in the batter I used chopped peppermint bark. I will make these every year from now on.
they were okay but a little doughy .. I suggest cooking them longer