Peppermint meltaways are one of the cookies I bake every Christmas. They’re small, frosted and topped with crushed peppermint candy, so they fit right in on a Christmas cookie tray next to whatever else you’re baking. The frosting even sets so they can be stacked and stored or easily gifted during the holidays.
The subtle peppermint flavor starts in the cookie itself. You taste it in a plain bite, and then again in the thick layer of sweet peppermint frosting and the crushed candy on top. Underneath all of that, it’s a soft cookie that resembles a melt-in-your-mouth sugar cookie with mint all through it.
Ingredient Notes
I use salted butter in the cookie dough and unsalted butter in the frosting, so pick up both before you start. There’s no other salt in the cookie, and the salted butter is the only place it comes from. Check the wrapper each time you reach for a stick so the two don’t trade places.
Spoon the flour into the measuring cup and level it off with the back of a knife. If you dip the cup straight into the bag, the flour packs down and more of it ends up in the dough than the recipe calls for.
Whether you crush candy canes or peppermint candies, pick the ones with the most red on them. The red is what shows on top of the frosting, and the more of it there is, the cuter these cookies look.
Watch Out For These Steps
Lumpy Dough
Right after the flour goes in, the dough looks dry, lumpy and thick, which is normal for cookie dough at that point. If you stop mixing there, you’ll be scooping dough that hasn’t come together yet.
Keep the mixer going until you can’t see any dry flour in the bowl. At that point the dough turns soft and moist, and you can scoop it right onto the pan.
Quick Setting Frosting
The peppermint frosting firms up fast, and it can start to set before you’ve reached the last cookie if you don’t prep ahead of time and work quickly.
Have all the cookies cooled and lined up before you start frosting, then work straight through the tray.
Make the whole amount of frosting the recipe calls for in one go. A smaller batch won’t cover all of them, and you’ll end up stopping to mix a second one partway through.
How To Tell These Cookies Are Done
These cookies come out of the oven pale. The tops stay pale and domed, and the edges spread just a little, so don’t wait for them to turn golden on top.
Take them out at eight minutes, then flip one over to check the bottom, which should be golden. A bottom that’s a shade darker than the rest is fine.
Storing and Freezing The Cookies
Give the frosted cookies one hour on the counter before you stack them. Once the frosting and crushed candy are on, I leave the cookies spread out on the counter until the frosting has hardened on every one of them. It takes about an hour. If you stack them any sooner, it gets messy.
Peppermint meltaways taste best on the day you bake them. But they’re still soft, with the peppermint coming through, on days two and three. The frosting and the crushed peppermint candy on top still look good the next day.
Once you stack the cookies, I keep them in an airtight container at a cool room temperature. If you’re baking for Christmas, that gives you a little room in a busy week to fit in a batch of candy cane cookies for the same tray. Bake and frost them up to two days before you plan to set them out.
For more of a head start, freeze the dough. Scoop it into balls the same way you would for baking, put them in an airtight container and freeze them for up to two months. When you’re ready, thaw the balls completely in the refrigerator, then bake and frost them as usual.
Recipe Test Notes: Last Update November 2026
This recipe was originally posted in November 2025, and was last tested in October 2026.
I’ve made peppermint meltaways on a few different doughs over the years. The 2023 version used flour and cornstarch, and that dough was crumbly so you had to squeeze each ball together by hand.
The next version switched to sweetened condensed milk and cornstarch. But when I asked my recipe tester what she thought of them, she told me the peppermint in the cookie was too mild, and that the frosting carried most of the flavor. We both found those cookies were a bit dryer than I would have liked.
For this version I went back to my lemon meltaway dough , which readers love, and put the mint into the dough instead. Since the frosting from previous versions tasted great, I used the same peppermint frosting and crushed peppermint candies previous iterations of the cookies had.
I asked my independent recipe tester, Karen, to make this version in October 2026. She portioned the dough with a two-teaspoon cookie scoop, and the balls held their shape without any time in the refrigerator.
Before any frosting went on, she tasted a plain cookie once it had cooled and left the extract at one teaspoon, since the frosting and the candy add more mint on top of it. The cookies held together well while she spread the frosting over them.
The frosting is the one part that changed after her test. I wanted a thicker layer on every cookie, so I quadrupled the frosting, and Karen made the cookies again with it later that month. She spread it on thicker and had less than half a cup of frosting left in the bowl at the end.
Peppermint Meltaway Cookies
Ingredients
Cookies
- 1 cup salted butter, room temperature (2 sticks, 226 grams)
- ¾ cup white sugar
- 1 large egg, room temperature
- 1 teaspoon peppermint extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
Frosting
- 4 cups powdered sugar, sifted
- 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
- 6 tablespoons heavy cream
- ½ to 1 teaspoon peppermint extract, amount depends on preferred peppermint flavor
Garnish
- peppermint candies, crushed
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375°F.
- In a medium-sized mixing bowl, mix butter and white sugar.
- Add the egg and continue to mix until combined.
- Stir in the peppermint extract.
- Combine flour and baking powder and add it in batches to the wet ingredients until fully mixed.
- Using a 2 teaspoons cookie scoop, scoop the dough and shape into a ball using your hands.
- Place onto a parchment paper-lined cookie sheet and flatten just a little.
- Bake for 8 minutes then remove from oven.
- After a few minutes, transfer to a wire cooling rack. Cookies will need to be completely cooled before frosting.
- While the cookies are cooling you can make the frosting by adding to a medium bowl the powdered sugar, melted butter, heavy cream and peppermint extract.
- Beat the mixture until thick and smooth. The frosting should be spreadable but should hold its shape when added to the cookies. You can add a little extra heavy cream (1 teaspoon at a time) if too thick, or extra powdered sugar (1-2 tablespoons at a time) if too thin.
- Frost each cookie and sprinkle with the crushed peppermint candy for garnish before plating and serving.
Notes
- You can crush up candy canes for the garnish or peppermint star candies if making these during a season that you can not find candy canes.
Comments
Gloria says
These are very good!!
Brenda says
Very good cookies and frosting! I did add extra half and half to the frosting so it was easier to spread.