Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (2024)

Published: · Modified: by Melanie Cagle · 21 Comments

Delicious buttery and soft, this Starbucks Snowman Recipe is perfect for making your favorite treat at home.

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Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (1)

Make your own favorite Starbucks Snowman Cookie recipe. They're perfectly rich, buttery and soft shortbread cookies with a sweet royal icing decorated top.

Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (2)

I love when the seasons change and we head into winter time. Starbucks start selling their Snowman Cookies and I LOVE THEM.

I sort of live in the boonies though and at my nearest Starbucks (about 7 miles away) it's hit or miss if they'll have any. That's when I took to figuring out how to make them at home myself.

Jump to:
  • ❤️ Why you'll love it
  • 🧅 Ingredients
  • 🥣 Instructions
  • 🔄 Substitutions and Variations
  • 🔌 Equipment
  • 📘 Related Recipes
  • 🧊 Storage
  • 💡 Tips
  • Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe
  • 💬 Comments

❤️ Why you'll love it

  • The sugar cookie recipes doesn't need refrigeration. You can whip up the recipe and have it in the oven quickly without it melting.
  • I make a fuss-free royal icing recipe that is perfect for beginners.
  • With this Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe you won't need to go buy them again - with this economy everything is so expensive. It's cheaper to make them at home.
  • This fun treat makes a perfect cookies for santa idea. They really have the holiday spirit.

🧅 Ingredients

Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (3)
  • Unsalted Butter
  • Powdered Sugar
  • Vanilla Extract
  • Cold Water
  • All Purpose Flour
  • Meringue Powder
  • Baking Powder
  • Salt
  • Egg
  • Foor Coloring

See recipe card at the bottom of this post for quantities.

🥣 Instructions

  1. Add 1 Cup of butter to your stand mixer bowl, along with the powdered sugar.
  2. Mix until fluffy - about 3-5 minutes.
  3. Add the vanilla and egg and mix again until well incorporated.
  4. In a separate bowl add the flour, salt and baking powder and mix with a whisk.
  1. Gradually add to the butter mixture while on low setting.
  2. Once the cookie dough has come together use your hands and knead a little in the mixing bowl.
  3. Remove half of the cookie dough and wrap with plastic wrap, set aside.
  4. Lightly flour a work surface and roll out the remaining cookie dough to about ⅓ or even ½ inch thick.
  1. Using a snowman cookie cutter cut out shapes from the cookie dough and lay on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.
  2. Make sure there is 2" between the cookies.
  3. Bake in a preheated oven for about 8 minutes, or until the edges start to brown a little.
  4. Remove and allow to cool on a wire rack completely before icing.
  1. To make the royal icing add the powdered sugar and meringue powder to a clean mixing bowl of your stand mixer and mixer together.
  2. Add the vanilla and water until a good royal icing consistency is reached. It should fall back into the bowl and hold it's shape for about 5 seconds before melting back into the icing.
  3. Take ¾ of this icing and add to a piping bag (pastry bag).
  4. The remaining split between 4 small bowls.
  1. You'll need a little orange icing. A little black (more than the orange though). A little blue and a little red.
  2. Ad each color to it's own piping bag. You could get away with just painting on the orange with a tooth pick.
  3. Using the white, pipe the edge of each cookie then fill in to cover the whole cookie. Use a tooth pick to help spread it out. Quickly sprinkle some silver/white sanding sugar on the bottom of each snowman (to represent snow).
  4. Once that white has dried somewhat you could paint on the other colors. Drop black spots for the buttons, eyes and mouth. The blue for scarves and ear muffs, the same for the red scarf. The orange is only needed for a little carrot nose on each cookie.
  5. Allow a few hours of drying time before stacking on top of each other.

Hint: Make sure that the cookies are completely cooled before trying to decorate them.

🔄 Substitutions and Variations

  • White Chocolate - melt chocolate chips and decorate for the white using that.
  • Egg Whites - This is the old fashioned way of making royal icing (before meringue powder came along). Egg whites with lemon juice or cream of tartar.
  • Almond Extract -add a little to the sugar cookies if you like.
Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (4)

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🔌 Equipment

The following are affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

I love to use my stand mixer for recipes like this however, if you don't have one or prefer you could use a hand mixer or electric mixer.

I have a list of all the equipment used in the recipe card below.

📘 Related Recipes

  • Snowflake Cookies
  • Grinch Cookies with Cake Mix
  • Christmas Oreo Cookies
  • Stacked Christmas Tree Cookies
  • Reindeer Cupcakes
  • Christmas Tree Dip

🧊 Storage

Once the royal icing has completely cooled and hardened the snowman cookies can be stored in an airtight container for up to 1 week, at room temperature.

💡 Tips

Expert Tip: If you don't have a snowman cookie cutter you can use simple round cookie cutters - just lightly make an imprint of snowman shapes using 3 different sizes then use a pizza cutter to roll around the outside edge.
There are also many snowman cookie cutters that have hats. I don't think it's a bad thing - just fill the snowman hat with the black icing - not the white.

Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (9)

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Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (10)

4.57 from 101 votes

Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe

Delicious buttery and soft, this Starbucks Snowman Recipe is perfect for making your favorite treat at home.

Prep Time45 minutes mins

Cook Time8 minutes mins

2nd Batch8 minutes mins

Total Time1 hour hr 1 minute min

Servings: 10

Cuisine: Copycat Recipes

Author: Melanie Cagle

Ingredients

  • 1 Cup Unsalted Butter softened
  • 2 Cups Powdered Sugar
  • 1 Large Egg
  • 2 Teaspoons Vanilla
  • 3-¼ Cups All Purpose Flour
  • 1-½ Teaspoons Baking Powder
  • 1 Teaspoon Salt
  • 1 lb Powdered Sugar
  • 3 Tablespoons Meringue Powder
  • ½ Tablespoon Vanilla
  • 6 Tablespoons Cold Water
  • Blue Food Color
  • Black Food Color
  • Red Food Color
  • Orange Food Color
  • Silver/white sanding sugar/ sprinkles

Instructions

  • Preheat oven to 400°F.

  • Add 1 Cup of butter to your stand mixer bowl, along with the powdered sugar.

  • Mix until fluffy - about 3-5 minutes.

  • Add the vanilla and egg and mix again until well incorporated.

  • In a separate bowl add the flour, salt and baking powder and mix with a whisk.

  • Gradually add to the butter mixture while on low setting.

  • Once the cookie dough has come together use your hands and knead a little in the mixing bowl.

  • Remove half of the cookie dough and wrap with plastic wrap, set aside.

  • Lightly flour a work surface and roll out the remaining cookie dough to about ⅓" thick.

  • Using a snowman cookie cutter cut out shapes from the cookie dough and lay on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

  • Make sure there is 2" between the cookies.

  • Bake in the oven for about 8 minutes, or until the edges start to brown a little.

  • Remove and allow to cool completely before icing.

  • To make the royal icing add the powdered sugar and meringue powder to a clean mixing bowl of your stand mixer and mixer together.

  • Add the vanilla and water until a good royal icing consistency is reached. It should fall back into the bowl and hold it's shape for about 5 seconds before melting back into the icing.

  • Take ¾ of this icing and add to a piping bag.

  • The remaining split between 4 small bowls.

  • You'll need a little orange icing. A little black (more than the orange though). A little blue and a little red.

  • Ad each color to it's own piping bag. You could get away with just painting on the orange with a tooth pick.

  • Using the white, pipe the edge of each cookie then fill in to cover the whole cookie. Use a tooth pick to help spread it out. Quickly sprinkle some silver/white sanding sugar on the bottom of each snowman (to represent snow).

  • Once that white has dried somewhat you could paint on the other colors. Drop black spots for the buttons, eyes and mouth. The blue for scarves and ear muffs, the same for the red. The orange is only needed for a little carrot nose on each cookie.

  • Allow a few hours of drying time before stacking on top of each other.

Notes

If you don't want to bother different colors for the scarves and ear muffs just choose red or blue (or your own color if you like).

Nutrition

Serving: 1g | Calories: 641kcal | Carbohydrates: 111g | Protein: 6g | Fat: 20g | Saturated Fat: 12g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 7g | Cholesterol: 67mg | Sodium: 324mg | Fiber: 2g | Sugar: 71g

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Reader Interactions

Comments

    Leave a Reply

  1. Stephanie says

    How much powdered sugar goes into the icing and how much powdered sugar goes into the dough?

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      Hi Stephanie, I have it separated in the recipe card at the bottom of the post. 2 Cups goes into the cookie dough and 1lb goes into the icing.

      Reply

    • Will Ellis says

      I say 1-1/2 into the dough, and 1/2 in the icing. U might have to add more to the icing depending on the consistency.

      Reply

  2. Jeannie Aviles says

    Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (15)
    I made stars . They were so delicious can’t keep them in the house . Absolutely delicious .

    Reply

  3. Amanda Spitalniak says

    I loved these cookies sooo much! The first batch I accidentally added 1 cup of baking powder lol. Don’t ask why. But the second time I did it right, and wow. These taste just like Starbucks but even better and fresher.

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      Oh wow, that's funny! lol
      I'm glad you enjoyed them Amanda! They're the perfect Christmas cookie aren't they?

      Reply

  4. CookieLvr says

    Before I try, are these cookies soft or crunchy/crumbly? Thanks.

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      They're more soft than they're crunchy.

      Reply

  5. Marta says

    Am I missing something here. Every recipe I’ve looked up uses royal icing… but aren’t the Starbucks snowman cookies made with chocolate? The ingredients listed are described as “white chocolaty coating.”

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      Actually, it's not chocolate that they use. They call it a 'White Chocolatey Coating' - but when you look at the ingredients it's literally sugar and palm oil .... a royal icing is practically identical. A Starbucks Snowman Cookie (from Starbucks) tastes just like this recipe.

      Reply

  6. Lucy says

    I feel like maybe I did something wrong, because my cookies tasted salty, except i only used a teaspoon, as listed. I also was not tasting the starbucks snowman cookie in these, so im wondering if i maybe made the cookies wrong? People in these comments say that they taste like the cookies, and i have no doubt that they do, i just thought mine tasted salty and just overall not great

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      The only thing I can think you did wrong here, is perhaps you used salted butter?

      Reply

      • Lucy says

        Oh yes I did! Thank you so much! I'll make them again and see

        Reply

  7. Debbie Fekete says

    The yield shows 10.. this only makes 10 cookies?
    I'm using this recipe for a family cookie decorating event and making 100 cookies. I wanted to check ahead of time so i can make sure I buy enough ingredients.

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      Yes, these cookies are quite big. About the size of your whole hand.

      Reply

  8. Vanessa says

    I want to make these so badly, but twice now my dough has been too crumbly to roll out. First time I thought maybe I over worked it. Second time I made sure I didn’t, and even microwaved the dough to see if it would melt the butter and help… still no luck. The first batch I tried adding a tbsp of milk. What could I be doing wrong?! My measurements are correct… help!

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      How did you measure out your flour? This can often be a mistake that people make that they add too much flour to a recipe. I recommend to use the spoon and level method. SPoon the flour into your measuring cup, then use a knife to level it off. Having a dough that's too crumbly sounds like perhaps too much flour?

      Reply

  9. Aide says

    Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (16)
    Haven’t tried this recipe yet although I will, just one question: it says to set side half of the cookie dough? What for?

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      Just so you aren't working with such a big batch - to roll out I mean.

      Reply

  10. Jane says

    Hi,
    Are these photos of your home baked snowman cookies or of the actual Starbucks cookies? I can never find a recipe that comes out on the crumbly/crunchier side like the real deal. Thanks

    Reply

    • Melanie Cagle says

      Hi Jane, I actually baked these snowman cookies at home. I wanted them to look just like the real deal, as it is a copycat recipe 😉

      Reply

Starbucks Snowman Cookie Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What is the icing on Starbucks snowman cookies? ›

Made with a shortbread biscuit and decorated with royal icing, this cookie is ideal for the holiday season!

How to do the snowman cookie pic? ›

First up, you're going to need a snowman cookie from Starbucks. Then you'll need to either break off the head of the snowman or nibble it off (we obviously prefer the latter). Just make sure your break occurs above the scarf. Now that your snowman is ready, you're going to take a photo of the snowman in your hand.

Does the Starbucks snowman cookie have chocolate? ›

This delightful bakery dessert is a popular treat with festive snowman-shaped design, topped with creamy vanilla frosting, and sweet mini chocolate chips. Made with high-quality ingredients and baked fresh daily, this frosted cookie is perfect for any time of day or a cozy winter night in.

Are Starbucks snowman cookies soft? ›

Buttery soft: Made on a shortbread base, this snowman cookie is really buttery and so soft it melts in your mouth.

What are the ingredients in Starbucks snowman cookies? ›

COOKIE [ENRICHED WHEAT FLOUR (WHEAT FLOUR, NIACIN, REDUCED IRON, THIAMINE MONONITRATE, RIBOFLAVIN, FOLIC ACID), MARGARINE (PALM OIL, WATER, SOYBEAN OIL, SALT, WHEY, MONO- AND DIGLYCERIDES, SOY LECITHIN, NATURAL FLAVOR, BETA CAROTENE (COLOR), VITAMIN A PALMITATE), BUTTER (PASTEURIZED CREAM, NATURAL FLAVORS), SUGAR, ...

What is cookie frosting made of? ›

For the icing, you need confectioners' sugar, water, vanilla extract (replace with water to keep the icing stark white, or use clear vanilla extract), a touch of corn syrup, and a little salt. The icing dries firm with a very slight crisp, so you can easily stack your decorated sugar cookies and travel with them.

How do you take the Starbucks snowman cookie picture on iPhone? ›

Step 3: If you have an iPhone, you can copy subjects over and grab just the cookie + your hand. I moved it into Instagram stories + moved my hand around until it completely covered my baby's diaper. Finally, save it! I used lightroom to brighten it up a tad but that's totally optional!

How do you take snowman cookies pictures on iPhone? ›

If you have an iPhone, take a photo of just the snowman cookie from Starbucks, and then take a separate photo. of your child looking at you. With iPhones, you can copy objects over. So I copy just my hand and the cookie.

How do you put a picture on a cookie? ›

You can print the image using edible ink and rice paper or icing paper. Then you can place the image on your iced cookie and fasten it before the icing sets. Of course if you happen to have access to a direct to food edible printer you can print directly onto the cookie.

What flavor is the snowman cake pop at Starbucks? ›

Fluffy vanilla cake and rich vanilla icing mixed to cake pop perfection, and then dipped in a white, chocolaty coating.

How long are snowman cookies good for? ›

Store melted snowman cookies in an airtight container at room temperature (away from heat, though!), and they'll stay good for 4-5 days.

What is Santa Claus's favorite cookie? ›

Chocolate Chip cookies

You can never go wrong with these classic, delicious cookies. Santa himself lists these as his favorites, and he prefers them soft and gooey with lots of chocolate chips. If you decide to leave these out for him, make sure there's a glass of cold milk nearby!

Are Starbucks cookies frozen? ›

Starbucks pastries are delivered to the stores frozen and they're thawed out on a daily basis,” Laura (@lauraxvo) wrote.

Why are my cookies crispy instead of soft? ›

Adding too little flour can cause cookies to be flat, greasy, and crispy. Most recipes assume you'll use all-purpose, but if you want a lighter, crumblier cookie texture, choose one with a lower protein content such as cake-and-pastry flour. Baking soda helps cookies spread outward and upward while cooking.

What is the secret to making cookies soft? ›

Cornstarch Is The Secret To Soft And Chewy Cookies.

Is cookie icing and frosting the same? ›

You'll be glad to know there is a distinction between the two. In broad terms, frosting is thick and fluffy, and is used to coat the outside (and often the inner layers) of a cake. Icing is thinner and glossier than frosting, and can be used as a glaze or for detailed decorating.

What's the difference between frosting and icing on cookies? ›

Frosting is the thickest of these confections and is ideal for spreading or piping on cakes, cupcakes and cookies. Icing is a little thinner than frosting and is often poured or piped over coffee cakes, pound cakes, doughnuts and cookies—and it usually hardens when it dries.

What is the difference between royal icing and Sugar Cookie icing? ›

Cookie icing can be used in the same way that royal icing can; however, it doesn't dry as hard as royal icing does. It's great for flooding cookies or piping designs into wet icing. To thin the consistency of cookie icing, just pop it in the microwave for about 20 seconds.

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