Spritz Pillow Cookies
Buttery spritz cookie dough with chocolate inside–how can you go wrong? It’s been so long ago that I don’t remember where we got the idea to tuck a little chocolate bar between the layers of delicate spritz dough, but they’ve been a special occasion favorite for years. At some point our family decided to call them Pillow Cookies because of their shape. We only make them during the holidays, and they are a must-have on Christmas Eve.
Spritz cookies can be made into beautiful shapes, limited only by the type of plates that come with your cookie press. Our cookie press is a vintage set that we found at a thrift store. It works better than a modern, rather expensive brand of cookie press that we tried. Note the type of cookie press plate to use:
Spritz Pillow Cookies
1 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
2 1/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla or almond extract
Miniature milk chocolate candy bars
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Unwrap and break candy bars into sections. You can also use regular or giant-size candy bars, but be sure to get candy bars with scored sections for ease in breaking them up. There will usually be no shortage of eager volunteers to do this job.
Mix butter and sugar. Add remaining ingredients and mix. Dough will be crumbly at first, then will stick together more as you mix. Load dough into cookie press, then screw on the lid.
Form long strips of dough on cookie sheet. Place mini candy bars at intervals on the dough strips.
Cover candy bars with a top layer of dough.
Use a kitchen knife to cut between candy bars.
Use the knife or your fingers to scoot the cookies away from each other to leave space between them on cookie sheet.
Bake 6-9 minutes at 400 degrees (in my oven, 6 1/2 minutes is about right. If they brown too much, they get hard rather than delicately crisp). Remove cookies to a rack to cool.
If you eat them while they’re warm, the chocolate is almost liquid. They freeze well, but usually there aren’t enough left around our kitchen to worry about that.
Try a batch and let us know how you like them!
they look delicious. How many do you get from a batch?
Welllll, I’ve never counted, but it makes 1 and 2/3 cookie sheets worth, so probably about 2 1/2 to 3 dozen!
Thank you, Charlotte. I cooked it and it’s delicious!!
This recipe idea was a Pillsbury Bakeoff winner in the 1960’s. The actual recipe is slightly different. It’s a traditional Christmas cookie in our family.
do you have that one? I lost ours and it is my husbands favorite !
–can’t wait to make
these w/ my mama
over the HOLIDAYS!!!
Thank you.
Been making these for years.
From Pillsbury bake off 1964.
They are called Chocolate pillows.
We love them.
The recipe and making of them in our family goes back to my great grandmother 105/110 years ago, although I make them by the gross they used a hand press so the treat was special and time consuming .. Called chocolate pillows as hershey bar pieces were square and looked like a throw pillow before the shape was changed .. The recipe I use calls for 1/4c shortening and 1/2c unsalted butter as well as 2tsp pure vanilla and hershey bar squares – I’ve added hershey dark chocolate and a white chocolate version, they are the best and most often requested cookie I bake
Brian, this is fascinating! Thank you for taking time to share! I’d love to taste your version. 🙂
My grandma makes these every Christmas for as long as I can remember. We enjoy baking them with her now and helping to decorate with sprinkles! We’ve tried large pieces of chocolate and have switched between milk and dark. Always a favorite and they never last long.
Does anyone have trouble making these…every time I try to make them the dough never comes out in a line and very difficult to do. I end up rolling it out and cutting with a pizza cutter. Any suggestion would help because I would love to be able to use my cooking press so they are prettier.
I have made thousands of these over the years and it sounds like your dough is either too stiff or there are dried chunks of dough plugging up the press. Try adding a little more water to the dough to soften it up and put a wet paper towel over the dough while it is waiting to be pressed.
I have made thousands of these over the years and it sounds like your dough is either too stiff or there are dried chunks of dough plugging up the press. Try adding a little more water to the dough to soften it up and put a wet paper towel over the dough while it is waiting to be pressed.