How do you crush the Jolly Ranchers?

To crush the Jolly Ranchers I suggest you place them in a plastic bag and use meat mallet or rolling pin to crush them.

Can I use different shapes to make Stained Glass Cookies?

Yes you absolutely can use different shapes to make these cookies.

Can I use a different candy to make these cookies?

If you don't have Jolly Ranchers, you can try using another colorful candy. Note I have not tested these cookies with different candies. I have heard that some lifesavers don't melt as prettily. You could also try lollipops.

Can these cookies be made ahead of time?

You can make the dough up to 3 days ahead and store it, wrapp the dough in plastic wrap a store it in the fridge.

Can this recipe be doubled?

Of course, you can makeas many as you want.

Easy Stained Glass Cookies - Scattered Thoughts of a Crafty Mom

Description

Stained Glass Cookies are so Festive! Made using a simple sugar cookie recipe, the glossy stained glass centers make them perfect for holiday cookie trays.

Ingredients

Scale

½ cup butter
½ cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 ½ cups flour
¼ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
15 jolly ranchers, unwrapped and crushed
½ cup powdered sugar (optional, for drizzle)
1–2 tablespoons milk (optional, for drizzle)

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Instructions

Preheat oven to 350º
Combine flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl, and set aside.
Cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Beat in egg and vanilla.
Stir in the flour mixture until the dough comes together. Roll the dough out on a floured surface (or parchment paper) to ¼-⅓ inch thick, sprinkling a little flour on top as needed to keep the dough from sticking to your rolling pin
Cut out with a circular cookie cutter, Then cut the center out with a smaller cookie cutter
Arrange on a parchment-lined cookie sheet, so no cookies are touching. (Parchment is important so that your melted candy doesn’t stick to the pan.)
Sprinkle crushed jolly ranchers in the cookie center.
Bake in the center of the oven for 10 minutes, until the cookies look set and the candy has melted and spread out. It may look bubbly, but it will settle as it cools
Remove from oven and let cool completely before removing from pan. The candy can take a while to set, so once it’s mostly cooled off, you can pop the cookie sheet in the refrigerator to speed it up.
For a glaze, you can mix powdered sugar and milk together and drizzle over the cookies.

Notes

Number of cookies is based on using a 3 ½ inch circular cutter, and 1 ½ inch cut out. Mine happened to be a wide mouth canning jar ring, and some little cookie cutters I found at TJ Maxx similar to these: https://amzn.to/3UyogZj
We tried using whole jolly ranchers, which worked alright, but crushing them makes sure they spread all the way into the various corners.
Spread the equivalent of one jolly rancher in each cookie. Overfilling can result in candy overflowing onto the cookie, which isn’t very pretty. Better to go thin than thick.

Nutrition

Serving Size: 1 cookie
Calories: 143
Fat: 7
Carbohydrates: 19
Protein: 2