Cinnamon Slice and Bake Cookies

Slice and Bake cookies are ideal if you want to keep some dough in the freezer for unexpected guests or that horrifying dessert emergency (like, when you burn whatever you were going to make, or you just really need a fresh-baked cookie).

These are pretty simple cinnamon cookies with a little cornmeal added for flavor and texture. They’re delicious and are perfect if you’re craving something cinnamon-y and sweet!

Plus…they’re kinda cool looking too.

Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients

2 ½ cups flour
½ cup cornmeal
1 t baking powder
¼ t baking soda
¼ t salt
1 cup butter, softened to room temperature, separated
½ cup sugar
2 eggs, separated
4 t vanilla, separated
½ cup dark brown sugar
1 T cinnamon
1 cup coarsely chopped pecans

Directions

Put the flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a bowl and whisk until everything is well combined. Set this bowl aside.

In a large bowl put the ½ cup of the butter and all the white (not brown) sugar and mix until fluffy, probably a couple minutes. Add in one of the eggs and 2 teaspoons of vanilla and mix again until well combined. Next, get your dry ingredients and add 1 ½ cups to the bowl and mix in until well combined and smooth. Don’t overmix – just get everything evenly distributed.

Take this dough, roll it into a log about 10” long, cover it with plastic wrap and stick it in the fridge. Note – don’t clean the bowl out yet – you ain’t done with it.

Get your remaining ½ cup butter and the brown sugar and add them to the mixing bowl. Mix until well combined, then add in the remaining egg and the remaining 2 teaspoons of vanilla and beat again. Next, add in the remaining dry ingredients and the cinnamon and beat until just combined. Again, don’t overmix, just get everything blended.

Do the same with this dough as you did the other dough – roll it into a 10” log, cover it with plastic wrap and refrigerate. You should leave this in the fridge for at least an hour, and you can clean up your workspace while you’re waiting. Because clean is good.

When you’re ready to bake, take both logs out of the fridge and cut them lengthwise. Roll the dough of half of one log into a long rope, maybe ½” or so thick. Next, take half of the other log and do the same.

Working quickly, put the two ropes next to each other and fold the whole thing in half, like this:

Then, give it a little twist:

Then fold it in half again:

And roll it into another log, again about 10” long.

Do this same thing with the other two halves, so that you once again have two 10” logs, but this time they’re both a mixture of the two different doughs. NOTE: The dough is going to get soft and sticky VERY quickly. Make room in your fridge or freezer – you might need to cook the dough off halfway through the process (I did) so that you can work with it.

Take a sheet of wax or parchment paper and spread out the chopped pecans. Roll each of the logs in the pecans, and feel free to press them in to make sure they stick. Take your two logs and cover in plastic wrap again and this time freeze the dough. It should be in there at least an hour or two, but it can be up to about 3 months, so this is really easy cookie dough to make ahead of time.

When you’re ready to bake, take a log out of the freezer and slice it into cookies about ¼” thick and put on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, 6 cookies to a sheet.

Bake at 350 for about 12 minutes until they start to get golden brown. Then, take them out of the oven, let them rest on the cookie sheet for a couple minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. That’s it!