Is your cookie press stashed away until the holidays? Pull that baby out and make these adorable, portable and delicious cookies for Valentine's Day, a girl's baby shower or birthday, or any day.

Our classic spritz cookies are flavored with strawberry jam and dipped in 72 percent cacao chocolate for a not-too-sweet adult treat. But you can bump up the sugar content and use milk or semi-sweet chocolate for your little ones. The jam lends a slight pink to the dough. We added a baby pea-size amount of burgundy gel food coloring to get the pink in the photos.

This recipe, adapted from one from Bake, Love, Give makes 4 dozen cookies, depending on how hard you press. We didn't count as we ate a bunch of the "ugly" ones. You'll probably end up with more!

These are a great choice if you want to ship a gift to someone, as they are still tasty after a week if you keep them tightly sealed. To extend their life, you can also store in the fridge for an extra few days or the freezer for up to a month.

1. Heat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
2. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone liners.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour with salt and baking powder. Set aside.
4. In your stand mixer, fitted with SideSwipe or flat beater: cream together softened butter and sugar on medium speed until well combined and fluffy. 
5. Add egg and vanilla. Mix on medium speed until well incorporated.
6. Add the dry ingredients all at once. Mix on lowest speed until moistened. Then increase mixer speed to medium-low just until combined.
7. Add strawberry jam and optional food color. Mix on low until color is distributed throughout the dough.
8. Load into cookie press fitted with the heart shaped disk.
9. Push dough through the cookie press onto lined cookie sheets. It takes a little practice to master the perfect technique. See NOTE below for tips on using a cookie press.
10. Bake at 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) for 8-10 minutes or until very light brown and set.
11. In a deep, narrow bowl, microwave chocolate/melting wafers in 30 second intervals, stirring until smooth. You can also use a double boiler on your stove, as we did, which we like better for controlling the heat.
12. Dip half of each cookie in melted chocolate and transfer to parchment or wax paper to set.
13. Store in an airtight container for up to one week.

NOTE:  Remember that the cookies will stick to the paper/silicone liner, so you should hold the press vertically, touch the rim to the pan, press quickly and then lift vertically for the best shape. You can place them fairly close together - about 1-2 inches between - as they do not expand very much.

This cheesecake will really wow your guests at any winter gathering. The intense red color comes from boxed red velvet cake mix and an entire large container of no-taste red gel food coloring. The crust is made from crushed chocolate sandwich cookies (you know the brand). This dessert is a hearty one, so a standard size cheesecake will serve at least 12 people.

The addition of the cake mix makes it necessary to use a water bath with this cheesecake. We forgot to add it  with this particular cake, and you can see that it sank and had huge cracks in it. You can avoid this by following our directions and using the water bath! If you do still get cracks, you can always top the cake with whipped cream or just go with it, like we did and call it "rustic." It's still delicious!

Our red velvet cheesecake stores well in the fridge for several days and can be frozen for up to three months if well wrapped.

You can see below what happens when you don't use a water bath. Go dry at your own risk :)

Here's another family favorite that my grandmas used to make. The powdered sugar-dusted classic, the crescent cookie. The grandmothers usually used walnuts, but we chose to make our recipe with pecans, as that's one of our favorites.

We all have a recipe for these, but these have more nuts than many recipes, so we wanted to share it. As usual, SideSwipe can churn through the ingredients with ease and make this a quick one to prepare. No chilling or rolling and cutting out shapes. This one's just a bit more involved than a drop cookie. And it's melt-in-the-mouth good!

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (170 degrees C).
2. Cream butter in your stand mixer (fitted with SideSwipe) at medium-high speed for 30 seconds. Add confectioners' sugar about a cup at a time and continue mixing at medium-high speed until light and fluffy.
3. Add salt and mix to combine.
4. Mix in pecans and vanilla at low to medium speed until fully incorporated.
5. Add flour into the mixer a bit at a time on lowest mixer speed. Continue until the mixture is well combined.
6. Scoop teaspoons of the dough (we use a cookie scoop for uniformity), Roll the scooped dough in your hands, shaping the ball into into crescents, or little moon shapes. You can also roll these into balls.
7.  Place on parchment-lined baking sheet and bake 12-15 minutes. Do NOT brown.
   
8. Let cool slightly, then roll cookies in confectioners' sugar.
9. Move to wire rack to cool completely. You may want to roll the cookies in powdered sugar again before serving if it looks like they need a boost.

Cookies keep for about 1 week at room temperature in a tightly sealed container. They also freeze well. Store away from other cookies, as all the cookies will take on the flavors of the others.

The linzer cookie, based on a traditional Austrian torte, is another holiday classic. A tender, buttery cookie is filled with jam, sandwiched and dusted with powdered sugar. Elegant, yet fairly simple to make.

This recipe by Alexandra Stafford via King Arthur Flour, substitutes almond flour for some of the traditional wheat flour in the recipe. It adds a little more texture to the biscuit (for you Brits), while still keeping it manageable with the wheat flour. The inclusion of fresh lemon zest lifts the taste the cookie and pairs really well with berry jam. We used strawberry in the ones in the photos, but you can use any kind of jam or preserve or even a curd it you like.

These keep on the counter for about three days, in the freezer for a month or so. Be careful when storing. It's hard to tough up the powdered sugar ones the cookies are sandwiched together.
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TIP:  This dough MUST be cold for rolling and cutting. It will be too sticky otherwise. Roll and cut in small batches using a dusting of flour to make the job easier.