pistachio sugar cookies

Pistachio has been having a moment for quite a while now, so I developed this pistachio cut out recipe a couple of years ago for my cookie decorating followers. It’s such a good cookie, with a classic soft, sugar cookie texture, crisp edges, very minimal to no spread, and SO MUCH nutty pistachio flavor. This recipe is perfect for cut out cookies decorated with royal icing, for stamping with cookie presses, for sandwiching with pistachio paste, or for covering with sparkling sugar and baking until crunchy.

why you’ll love pistachio sugar cookies

• This cookie is delicious and full of real pistachio flavor from ground pistachios.
• They hold their shape, making them great for cookie decorating.
• You can make multiple cookies from this one basic dough, including a soft sugar cookie and crunchy cookie. (Variations later in this post.)

ingredients in pistachio sugar cookies

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• unsalted butter– room temperature (Salted butter is fine in this recipe.)
• granulated sugar– for texture and sweetness
• salt– Diamond Crystal kosher salt is the best for baking, so I recommend grabbing a box if you can. It will last you for a long time if you just use it for baking! If you don’t have this type of salt, swap for regular table salt and use half the amount called for.
• egg– An egg will add structure and tenderness.
• vanilla– for flavor (I love to use vanilla bean paste because the flavor is more intense, but vanilla extract is great as well. I love The Spice House, Heilala, and Nielsen-Massey.)
• almond extract– I love the flavor of almond extract, but I know it is a very polarizing flavor. If you don’t like it, leave it out. It just gives a boost to the pistachio flavor and makes this cookie extra delicious.
• all purpose flour– I love King Arthur flour.
• pistachios– If you can, buy pre-ground pistachios to make your life significantly easier. I like this one and this one.
• baking powder– This is optional if you want extra crisp edges for decorating. It just gives a bit of lift to the cookie.

supplies needed to make pistachio sugar cookies

• scale– Using a scale makes everything easier with baking, and it ensures you get the same results every time. Flour is so easy to over-add with volume measurements, and a scale solves that problem.
• stand mixer with paddle attachment or hand mixer
• rolling pin– If you don’t have a guided rolling pin, I totally recommend it, because it will make your life much easier if you roll dough often. I love these from Food52, but this one from Target is also amazing because there are many options for the guides.
• parchment paper– I love these pre-cut parchment papers. I’ve been using these for years.
• baking sheets
• cookie cutters– Here’s the link for the pretzel cutter.

how to make pistachio sugar cookies

I prefer to buy ground raw pistachios, but if you only have whole pistachios, weigh the amount called for and grind them to a powder in a food processor. Try to use raw, unsalted pistachios, lightly roasting them in the oven at 350 F to bring out the flavor. If you use salted pistachios, you will want to lower the salt content in the dough. This is the pistachio flour I like to use, but I recently tried this one and loved it.

This dough is very straightforward and uses the creaming method to mix the dough. Cream the butter, sugar, and salt until combined and only slightly fluffy, making sure there are no butter lumps. Add the egg, vanilla, and almond extract until combined and emulsified. Add the flour, pistachio flour, and baking powder all at once and mix until it forms a dough. If it seems too sticky, add up to 30g (¼ cup) flour and mix again.

Drop the dough onto a lightly floured piece of parchment paper, gently flattening it with your hands. Sprinkle lightly with flour and place another piece of parchment on top. Roll the dough to your desired thickness, ¼″-⅜″ for thicker, soft sugar cookies, and ⅙″-⅛″ for thin, crunchy cookies.

Refrigerate the sheets of dough for an hour or two, or even overnight. Refrigerating is an important step that chills the butter and keeps the cookies from spreading in the oven. If you’re pressed for time, 15-30 minutes in the freezer will chill it fast.

Using cookie cutters, cut out shapes from the dough, placing the cut cookie dough on a parchment lined baking sheet. Pair similarly sized cookies together on the baking sheets, giving them an inch or two of space between them.

Bake the cookies at 375 F for 8-10 minutes for larger cookies. They should look set and not shiny on top. For soft cookies, don’t bake any longer from the time they are no longer shiny. For crunchy cookies, bake until the edges are golden brown.

Cool them on the baking sheet for a few minutes before transferring them to a wire rack to cool completely before frosting or icing.

Decorate the cookies how you’d like! I used royal icing to make these St. Patrick’s Day cookies. Here is my royal icing recipe if you’d like to give it a try! It’s salted and flavored with vanilla bean paste, so it is extra delicious. Add a little butter extract, and it will practically taste like buttercream.

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using cookie stamps

I love the simplicity of using cookie stamps! Because they leave and impression, there’s no need for decorating. I got my stamp from Joanne Fabrics (RIP), but any impression cookie cutter will work. I used the exact same dough from above rolled to the ¼″ thickness.

Make sure to freeze these cookies for five minutes before being if you can, just to help them keep their shape and impression. Bake exactly as you would above. (375 F for 8-10 minutes or until set and no longer shiny.)

variations on pistachio sugar cookies

crunchy sparkling pretzels

I absolutely love making crunchy sparkling pretzel cookies, and pistachios just elevate them even more. Unfortunately, the cookie cutter is really expensive, but I think it’s worth it. I plan to keep using it, so expect to see lots more cookie pretzels.

To make pistachio sugar cookie pretzels, roll the dough more thinly than you would roll a regular sugar cookie so that it can become a crunchy texture rather than soft. I like to roll these to ⅙″ or ⅛″ depending on what I’m feeling like. I really recommend getting a guided rolling pin to make rolling easier.

Make an egg white wash by whisking an egg white with a teaspoon of water. Brush the egg white over the surface of the cookie dough and sprinkle with sparkling sugar.

Bake the cookies at 375 F for 8-10 minutes, or until the edges are golden brown. They may need more time depending on your oven and depending on how thick you rolled the dough. Let them cool on the sheet for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Pipe pistachio cream over the surface of a non-sparkled pretzel and sandwich with a sparkling pretzel. I like these pistachio creams: this one, this one, this one, and this one. This pistachio spread is my favorite of all time, but it’s less sweet and more runny than the others. That makes it more versatile for baking (and coffee!), but it doesn’t work as well in this application.

sparkling pistachio liners with pistachio cream

I used the same dough that I used for the sparkling pretzels to make these tiny linzer cookies. I cut scalloped squares, and from the squares, I cut another square leaving a very thin border of dough. I baked them just as I did the pretzels, covering them with an egg wash and sparkling sugar before baking. They baked up nice and crunchy, and the thin cookies didn’t break!

To the solid square, I piped a large amount of pistachio cream and then sandwiched it with the border cookie.

success tips for making pistachio sugar cookies

• Mise en place’ is a French phrase with the idea of putting everything in its place before beginning to make a recipe. It helps everything to go smoothly and eliminates so much possible stress. Getting all of your supplies and ingredients together beforeever starting the recipe will help tremendously.
• Weigh your ingredients, particularly the flour. It is the most important measurement in this recipe to weigh. Flour can be off in volume measurements by up to 30g, which is a quarter cup! Having incorrect flour measurements can cause your cookies to spread too much or, alternatively, be dry and crumbly. Weighing your ingredients makes everything so much easier, as you don’t have to wash all the measuring cups at the end. However, I do not use the scale to weigh out teaspoon or tablespoon measurements for things like baking powder, salt, vanilla, or cornstarch, for example.
• Chill your dough to help it keep its shape. I’ve found that the best method is to roll the dough between parchment right after mixing before chilling it for a couple hours, if possible. Once it’s been chilled, I cut the shapes and put them on a parchment lined baking sheet. If I’m fast, I don’t chill again. But if the dough feels soft or “bendy” after cutting the cookies, I put the tray in the freezer for five minutes before baking. This ensures that the cookies keep their shape.
• If you are using this dough for cookie decorating, and you really want crisp edges, you can add 30g (¼ cup) all purpose flour to the dough and remove the baking powder.
• For soft cookies, roll the dough to ¼″ (or even thicker, like ⅜″ or 5/16″- guided rolling pins really help with precision) and bake them just until the tops are no longer shiny.
• For crispy cookies, roll the dough to ⅙″ or ⅛″ and bake until the edges start to brown.
• For freezing, see below ⬇️

freezing pistachio sugar cookies

First of all, can you freeze pistachio sugar cookies? Yes, you definitely can! I made this dough and ran out of time to bake them, so I put all the cut cookies in the freezer where they stayed for a few weeks. You can freeze sheets of rolled dough or cut cookies. I don’t recommend freezing a lump of dough, because that will just end up being a hassle to roll out.

To freeze, place the cut cookies in a single layer on a piece of parchment paper in a freezer-friendly container. Place a piece of parchment paper on top of the cookies and begin another layer of cookies. Make sure the cover for the container is airtight before putting in the freezer. For extra protection, wrap the container in plastic wrap. You can store cookie dough in the freezer for several months.

FAQs

• Is this the same pistachio sugar cookie you used to sell? Yes, it is!
• Can I use other nut flours? While I haven’t tried it myself, it should work in theory. If you try it, let me know! I’ll probably be trying it eventually.
• Why did my cookies spread? So many things affect spread. These will spread a tiny bit but still hold their shape. If they spread more than that, you may need to add more flour next time. Try adding 30g (¼ cup) more all purpose flour. You may also need to chill your dough for longer. I like to freeze my sheet of cookies for five minutes before baking to ensure even less spread.

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