Red and Green Cookies

I am a cookie kind of girl. I like that you can make tons of dough ahead of time and just pull it out whenever you want and bake.
I made these cookies to take to my friend's house for our usual after Christmas walk down memory lane. I basically took my staple chocolate chip recipe and took out the chips and added dried cranberries and pistachios. Yum.

Red and Green Cookies
Makes aprx 3 dozen cookies

3 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, room temp
1 cup (packed) golden brown sugar
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups dried cranberries
1 cup coarsely chopped pistachios

Preheat the oven to 350 degree F.

Sift the flour, baking soda and salt together in a large bowl.

Using an electric mixer, beat the butter in a large bowl until fluffy. Add both sugars and beat until blended. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Add vanilla. Slowly add the dry ingredients and beat until just blended.

Using a spatula, fold in the cranberries and pistachios.

Drop dough onto your prepared cookie sheets. I wouldn't recommend using non stick spray b/c that will cause the cookies to spread too much. Place the cookies at least 1 1/2 inches apart.


Bake the cookies until just golden, about 18 minutes for larger cookies, or about 15 minutes for smaller cookies.

You can definitely make these ahead of time as well. Just make sure after they've cooled completely to store them in an airtight container, like the one I used in my top picture.

You can also add chocolate chunks to them. White chocolate would work well with these for the whole xmas theme of the red cranberries and green pistachios, but in all honesty, I am not a fan... I would probably just coarsely chop a bar of chocolate, whichever you prefer, but I would definitely go with milk chocolate, and fold that in with the berries and nuts.
And any variation of dried berries and nuts would work with this, like macadamia and blueberry or cherry and almond.