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Favourite Christmas Half Moon Cookies

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Submitted by kittyjoe

Half moon cookies with a soft, cake-like buttermilk crumb, frosted half white and half chocolate. The classic upstate New York holiday cookie, also known as a black-and-white.

YIELD

60 servings

PREP

35 min

COOK

10 min

READY

1 hrs

Favourite Christmas Half Moon Cookies are an upstate New York holiday tradition, particularly around the Utica and Mohawk Valley regions where bakeries have sold them by the dozen for over a century. They look similar to the New York City black-and-whites, but the resemblance ends at the frosting. Half moons are softer, fluffier, and cake-like rather than dense, with a buttermilk crumb closer to a flat cupcake than a cookie.

The trick to that pillowy texture is the buttermilk and the way the baking soda dissolves into it before joining the batter. Quarter-cup portions get scooped onto the sheet and bake into puffy domes. Once cooled, the cookies flip so the flat bottom faces up, ready to be frosted half white and half chocolate. That flat surface is what makes the iconic two-tone presentation possible.

Pro Tips

  • Drop big quarter-cup portions. The recipe calls for sixty cookies but they’re meant to be substantial. Smaller cookies bake too thin and dry.
  • Pull from the oven when the edges are barely golden but the tops still look pale. They keep cooking on the sheet, and over-baking gives a tough cookie instead of a tender one.
  • Frost the flat side (the underside during baking). The dome top is uneven and won’t look as clean.
  • Use a butter-based frosting for both halves, the same base tinted with cocoa for the chocolate side. Different bases on each half taste mismatched.

Variations

  • Add a teaspoon of lemon zest to the dough for a brighter, more old-fashioned flavor.
  • Use vanilla extract in the white frosting and a teaspoon of espresso powder in the chocolate side.
  • Make smaller cookies for a tea-tray presentation, just shorten the bake time to 6 to 8 minutes.

Ingredients

1 ½ 355
CUPS ML SUGAR
¾ 177
2 2
LARGE LARGE EGGS
3 710
1 5
TEASPOON ML BAKING POWDER
1 5
TEASPOON ML BAKING SODA
1 237
CUP ML BUTTERMILK

Directions

Cream together the sugar, shortening, and eggs. Set aside. Mix together the flour and baking powder. Set aside.

Mix together the baking soda and the buttermilk. Alternate flour and buttermilk while stirring into creamed mixture.

Drop by ¼ cups onto a greased cookie sheet forming balls. Bake at 350℉ (180℃) F for 8 to 10 minutes.

Flip over when cool and frost half with white frosting and half with chocolate frosting.

* not incl. in nutrient facts Arrow up button

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Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 17g (0.6 oz)
Amount per Serving
Calories 46 5% from fat
 % Daily Value *
Total Fat 0g 0%
Saturated Fat 0g 0%
Trans Fat 0g
Cholesterol 7mg 2%
Sodium 16mg 1%
Total Carbohydrate 3g 3%
Dietary Fiber 0g 1%
Sugars g
Protein 2g
Vitamin A 0% Vitamin C 0%
Calcium 1% Iron 2%
* based on a 2,000 calorie diet How is this calculated?
 

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