50 Easy Christmas Treats for Kids of All Ages
Updated: Dec. 03, 2023
From reindeer cookies with pretzel antlers to homemade holiday marshmallows, kids and their grown-ups will love making these festive Christmas treats.
The holidays are a time for family togetherness. So instead of turning on a Christmas movie for the kids to watch while you bake, invite them into the kitchen for a fun baking lesson. They’ll love mixing, decorating and assembling festive cookies, marshmallow treats and holiday bark. Just be sure to buy extra toppings—the chocolate chips, sprinkles and peanut butter cups tend to disappear when little hands are helping.
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Santa Claus Cookies
Turn Nutter Butter cookies into the jolly man himself with this easy craft project. The kids will have a blast creating santa.
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No-Bake Christmas Wreath Cookies
They’re sticky, gooey and tons of fun for kids of all ages to make—big kids like you included. If you can make Rice Krispies treats, whipping up these festive wreaths will be a breeze.
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Oreos and Candy Cane Chocolate Bark
You’ll only need five ingredients and about 15 minutes to make this magical bark, so it’s perfect for smaller kids with shorter attention spans. They’ll love crushing the candy canes with a rolling pin and licking the bowl.
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Frosty Polar Bears
These can also be dipped in milk or dark chocolate for a whole forest of tasty bear friends. If you don’t have peanut butter on hand, use Nutella or cookie butter for equally delicious results.
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Easy Chocolate Gingerbread Cutouts
A package of store-bought chocolate cake mix makes this recipe extra quick and easy. If you don’t have a piping bag, use a Ziploc bag with one corner cut off.
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Holiday Reindeer Cookies
The chocolate coating for these adorable treats is melted in the microwave, so kids can help with almost every step. They’ll love using M&M’s or Red Hots to decorate Rudolph’s nose.
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No-Bake Cookie Butter Blossoms
You’ll only need four ingredients to create these ridiculously easy no-bake cookies. Just heat the cookie spread and corn syrup in a saucepan, stir in the rice cereal and press a chocolate kiss into the center of each cookie.
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Snowman Oreo Balls
Kids will love transforming their favorite cookie into Oreo balls. The cookies are crushed in a food processor, then mixed with cream cheese and dipped in melted candy coating. A mini Oreo and a Rolo candy create the snowman’s adorable top hat.
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Chocolate-Covered Pretzels
Sure, you could spend a fortune buying pre-made chocolate-covered pretzels at the bakery—or you could create your own with just four ingredients. Experiment with different types of chocolate, like white, milk and dark, to create an elevated snack spread.
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Cream Cheese Candies
Be warned: These irresistible cream cheese candies tend to disappear quickly. The recipe calls for peppermint or almond extract, but you can add any flavor you like, such as cherry or lemon.
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Peanut Butter Christmas Mice
Santa deserves an extra special treat on his plate this year, and these sweet peanut butter mice are just the ticket. Kids will love attaching the licorice tails and peanut ears.
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Cinnamon Almond Brittle
Grown-ups need to pay close attention to the candy’s temperature while it cooks. Once the brittle cools and hardens, kids will love breaking it apart.
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Peanut Butter Penguins
Store-bought Nutter Butter cookies are dipped in dark chocolate candy coating and adorned with M&M’s, candy eyes and more. The result is a gang of penguins that are almost too cute to eat.
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Holiday Cornflake Cookies
These cute little wreaths require only three ingredients: butter, marshmallows and frosted cornflakes. Decorate them with Red Hot candies, sprinkles and whatever else your heart desires.
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Homemade Holiday Marshmallows
Make homemade marshmallows at the beginning of December and they’ll last all the way until New Year’s. Store them in an airtight cookie storage container in a cool dry place for up to four weeks.
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Chocolate Caramel Wafers
Little bakers will love breaking the chocolate into squares—and eating a few—before placing one on each vanilla wafer cookie. If you don’t have an icing spatula, a butter or cheese knife will do the trick.
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Snowman Treats
The color of the snowmen’s earmuffs are up to you. Opt for green, red, blue or yellow M&M’s and then use any leftover candy corn from Halloween to create the nose.
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Potato Chip Clusters
These treats are super customizable. If you don’t have a bag of potato chips lying around, you could also try Fritos or shoestring potatoes to achieve a similar salty crunch. For a peanut buttery twist, try 4 cups of peanut butter chips and 2 cups milk chocolate chips instead of white chocolate. Swap 3 cups dry roasted peanuts for pecans, then make the clusters as directed.
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Chocolate Reindeer Cookies
Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen…the reindeer gang’s all here. Little hands will love adding pretzel antlers, candy eyes and white peanut butter cup snouts.
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Decorated Christmas Cutout Cookies
A holiday classic for a reason, these simple and beautiful cookies make great gifts. Don’t skip the important step of chilling the dough: It helps the butter and other fats solidify, giving the cookies a deep flavor and chewy texture.
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Snowman Doughnuts
If baking isn’t your thing, this is the recipe for you. There’s no actual cooking involved, just assembly, making it a fantastic rainy-day project for kids. But if you want extra credit, you could also make homemade doughnuts.
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Cathedral Cookies
These cookies are named for the stained-glass pattern they make when they’re sliced. Cathedral cookies are always the star of the cookie plate…if they make it there before getting eaten, that is.
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Fun & Festive Cake Pops
Cake pops are fun to eat, but if you’re a beginner, making them can sometimes get complicated. Thanks to store-bought cake mix, prepared frosting and confectioners’ candy coatings, these cake pops are a breeze, even for kids.
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Reindeer Brownies
If you’re short on time, use a boxed brownie mix to keep things simple. Then, the fun starts: Kids will love spreading on the chocolate frosting, adding candy eyes and red candy noses.
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Peppermint Hot Chocolate Cookies
If you’re not sure when company will be stopping by, it’s possible to freeze these cookies for later. After baking and cooling them, arrange them on a single layer on a baking sheet, then put them in the freezer for 30 minutes, or until the cookies are frozen solid. Then, layer the frozen cookies in an airtight container with parchment paper separating the layers. They’ll last in the freezer for up to three months!
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Gingerbread Men Cookies
Royal icing is a great decorating choice for gingerbread men because it’s opaque and will dry hard to make the cookies easier to handle. Use gel or paste food coloring to achieve deep colors, like red or green, and liquid food coloring for pastel pinks and yellows.
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Christmas M&M’s Cookies
Simple cookies call for one simple trick: Chill the dough for about 30 minutes before baking so they retain a nice round shape and don’t turn out too flat. Once you’ve mastered this cheery take on chocolate chip cookies, use any leftover M&M’s for M&M Cookie Bars—the red and green coating will make the bars look festive too.
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Buddy the Elf Bark
This dessert based on your kid’s favorite Christmas movie—OK, yours, too—couldn’t be more fun to make. The unexpected addition of crunchy ramen noodles makes this treat a blast to create and even more fun to eat.
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Easy Reindeer Cookies
The recipe calls for a package of store-bought peanut butter cookie mix, but if you’d rather make your own, your favorite peanut butter cookie recipe will work too. Pretzel antlers don’t just look cute, they add a delicious sweet-and-salty flavor combination that’s irresistible.
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Christmas Sugar Cookies
Keep the cookies fresh and soft by sealing them in an airtight container, like a resealable freezer bag, when you aren’t munching them. If they’re starting to get too hard or crispy, soften cookies by adding a slice of white bread to the bag. The cookies will absorb the moisture, making the bread harder and the cookies softer.
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Chocolate-Dipped Pretzel Rods
Cookies shouldn’t have all the fun on Christmas. Shake things up with these fun chocolate-dipped pretzels, which kids will love dipping in all sorts of colorful sprinkles.
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Gingerbread Teddy Bears
These soft and chewy bears are a bit time-intensive, so kids might want to be called in for the second leg of the baking process. They’ll love adding sprinkles for the nose, fingers and toes. But all that effort is worth it—one of our readers calls it a “ten-star recipe.”
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Christmas Candy Cane Cookies
The only thing better than a candy cane is one of these creative Christmas cookies, which feature a crushed peppermint candy topping. Let the kids assist with the candy crushing and the dough twisting.
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Peppermint Brownies
If you have extra crushed peppermint candies from the previous recipe, whip up a batch of these peppermint brownies. Add a teaspoon of peppermint extract to make them extra minty.
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Cherry Cookies
While maraschino cherries are recommended in the recipe, you can substitute another type of cherry if desired. We suggest candied cherries or dried cherries for best results.
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Peanut Butter Snowballs
These five-ingredient confections require only 15 minutes of prep time; plus they’re frozen, not baked, so kids can help from start to finish. There’s no chopping if you use candy coating disks instead of bars.
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Microwave Fudge
If you thought fudge was an all-day event that required double boilers, fancy thermometers and endless stirring, think again. You’re five ingredients and about 10 minutes away from dessert nirvana.
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Peanut Butter Blossom Cookies
Peanut butter cookies of all sorts are always a hit, but it’s just not Christmas without these quintessential holiday cookies. For an extra special touch, make your own peanut butter for this recipe.
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Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
Here’s how these cookies get their crinkle: As they transform from dough balls to flat cookies in the oven, the powdered sugar begins to dry out, creating a cracked effect. Store any extra cookies at room temperature in an airtight container for up to five days.
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Tootsie Roll Fudge
Tip: You can melt Tootsie Rolls in the microwave! Heat the unwrapped candies in 10 to 15 second intervals, then stir and repeat until the mixture melts.
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Nutty Rice Krispie Cookies
If you don’t have Rice Krispies on hand, you can use any kind of breakfast cereal to create these crunchy cookies. We love Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Chex and Corn Flakes.
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Easy Mint Thins
If you’re a fan of Girl Scout cookies, you’ll love these semi-homemade treats. Here, Ritz crackers are dipped and drizzled with chocolate, then decorated with assorted minty toppings.
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Yummy Cracker Snacks
Once again, Ritz crackers to the rescue! They get a makeover with peanut butter, marshmallow cream, milk chocolate candy coating and a generous dusting of sprinkles.
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White Chip Peanut-Pretzel Clusters
We’ve never met a Rice Krispies treat we didn’t like, but this green-and-red version is extra special. With peanut butter, roasted peanuts, crushed pretzels and M&M’s, it satisfies every craving.
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Chocolate Peanut Butter Grahams
It doesn’t get easier or tastier than this three-ingredient recipe. Kids will love spreading peanut butter on the graham crackers, then dipping them in melted chocolate—and, of course, licking the chocolatey spoon.
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Miniature Peanut Butter Treats
Tiny peanut butter cups are the star of these decadent cookies, which are pressed into the dough after it’s been baked. This one-bowl recipe is so easy and straightforward, kids will be able to follow along and help.
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Elf Cookies
The dough is store-bought, so you can focus on the most important part: the decorations! Encourage the kids to get creative with sprinkles, as well as almond slivers for ears.
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Chocolate Mint Sandwich Cookies
To make these cookies even more festive, separate the filling into two bowls, then use food coloring to dye one bowl red and the other bowl green. Fill half of the cookies with the green cream and half with the red cream.
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Cherry Surprise Cookies
You’ll need to master our basic cookie dough recipe to make these cherry-topped delights. Next, try chocolate mallow cookies and jelly sandwich cookies, which use the same cookie dough base and will add flair to any Christmas dessert spread.
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Peanut Butter Kiss Cookies
Gluten-free kids and adults alike will love making these flourless cookies. They’re delightfully crunchy and sweet with just peanut butter, sugar, an egg, vanilla extract and lots of chocolate kisses.
Originally Published: December 08, 2019
