Orange-Frosted Cranberry Cookies

Please forgive my delay in posting!  I have been having trouble getting my font consistent among/throughout posts, so my OCD has won out over the past few months as I tried to fix it.  It may not be corrected yet but I wanted to get some posts up, so try not to remind me if they don't look as perfect as I think they have to. :-)
 

Happy New Year!  We're now 1.5 months into 2011 and I still think about these cookies.  This became my go-to recipe this season and I think I made more than 20 dozen during the month of December.  I participated in the cookie exchange at work and because I had two pounds of cranberries left over from Thanksgiving, I wanted a recipe that would let me use those.  

Why did I have two pounds of cranberries?  Well, instead of buying the standard 12-ounce bag for a batch of cranberry sauce, Hubby decided that we needed to buy the 3-pound bag at Sam's Club instead.  It's things like 3-pound bags of cranberries that I try to avoid sending him to the grocery store by himself.

Anyway, when I was searching for cookies with cranberries I came across this Betty Crocker recipe on the internet.  It's delicious!  I made 10 dozen for the cookie exchange and then continued to bake them (using a second giant bag of cranberries) throughout the season.  I altered my recipe a bit from Betty's version, and I've reflected those changes below.  I stored some of the cookies in airtight tins/containers and they stayed VERY soft, but even the ones I left out for a few days didn't really get stale.

Lastly, if you don't have a cookie scoop I highly recommend one!  I have a running list of items on Amazon that I throw into my cart when I need free shipping, and this Oxo Medium Cookie Scoop was about $10 and one of the best baking investments I've ever made.  You fly through the batches and each cookie comes out the same size and bakes evenly.

A few tips:

• Take your butter right from the fridge to the microwave and soften it until it's melting on the bottom and very soft (but intact) in the rest of the stick.
• Use your food processor to chop the cranberries instead of doing it by hand.
• Instead of dipping the cookies in the frosting, set the cookies up on a foil-lined baking sheet and use a silicone pastry brush to frost them.  Then put the baking sheets in the fridge for 10-15 minutes to help the icing set.  Leave the cookies out overnight to make sure they set the rest of the way.

Orange-Frosted Cranberry Cookies

original recipe from Betty Crocker's website

makes ~4 dozen

Cookies

3/4 cup granulated white sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar (packed)

1 cup butter or margarine, softened-to-nearly-melted

1 tsp grated orange peel

2 tbsp orange juice

1 egg

2 1/2 cups AP flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

2 cups coarsely chopped cranberries 

Frosting

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

2-3 tbsp orange juice

1/2 tsp grated orange peel

Heat oven to 375 degrees and spray cookie sheets with non-stick spray, or line with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, beat granulated sugar, brown sugar, butter, orange peel, orange juice, and egg on medium speed (or stir with a spoon).  Stir in flour, baking soda, and salt.  Stir in cranberries.

Drop by rounded tablespoons onto the cookie sheets.  (My cookie scoop held 1.5 tbsp of dough, so I got about half the predicted yield.)  

Bake 12-14 minutes or until edges and bottoms of cookies are light golden brown.  Transfer to cooling rack for 30 minutes.

In a small bowl, stir together frosting ingredients until combined.  Use a silicone pastry brush to frost cookies with a thin coat.