Rich, chocolate crinkle cookies topped with edible holly berries made out of sugar are the perfect holiday cookie. Add them to your Christmas cookie tray!

Do you enjoy baking cookies during the holiday season? These chocolate crinkle cookies are as classic of a recipe as Christmas Linzer cookies. They are so easy to make that you can whip up a batch while listening to Christmas music and wrapping presents.

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It seems like Christmas happens sooner and sooner every year! It’s already time to start thinking about parties, decorations, and setting out cookies for Santa Clause.

Today, I’m sharing the recipe for my oh-so-sweet and oh-so-easy crinkle cookies. Since I made them with chocolate, they are a huge hit at holiday parties.

How To Make Christmas Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

These crinkle cookies are actually made from a cake mix with a few tweaks to the recipe. All it takes is some simple ingredients (that are most likely already in your pantry!) and a bit of imagination.

Kitchen Tools Needed:

Ingredients Needed

All the exact amounts you need are in the printable recipe card at the bottom of this post. First, here is a quick list of what you need to get from the store.

For the cookies:

For the decorations:

Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

The entire recipe is in the printable recipe card, just a little bit further below. First, here are some additional tips!

How many cookies does this make?

Depending on how big you make the cookies, this recipe will give you about 18 cookies. If you are going to hand them out in your cookie trays, I suggest doubling the recipe.

Yes, you should chill the dough before you roll the cookies out. Chilling the dough makes it easier to roll the cookies into balls. Refrigerate the dough for at least 30 minutes or as long as a few hours.

How do you make the holly decorations on the cookies?

This is the fun part! Here’s how I made the holly decorations on each cookie. I used both frosting and fondant for it.

First, use a round frosting tip to create 2-3 circles on each cookie.

Then, roll 36 small spheres out of your green fondant. Flatten the fondant spheres, giving each a pointed end. Use scissors to cut out a leafy-edge.

Finally, frost out a bit of white frosting on the back of each fondant leaf. Add 2 leaves to each cookie.

That’s it! These little decorations are completely optional – the cookies look and taste perfect without them. If you enjoy working with fondants, then make them, but if not, it’s ok to skip it.

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Holly Crinkle Cookies: The Cutest Cookies You’ll Make This Season

Print Recipe

Crinkle cookies are easy to bake and their festive sprinkling of powdered sugar makes family and friends excited to celebrate any occasion.

Prep Time:15

Cook Time:12

Chill the dough:30

Total Time:57

SERVINGS

Equipment

Ingredients

For The Cookies

1 box chocolate cake mix
⅓ cup canola oil
2 eggs at room temperature
3 tbsp granulated sugar
6 tbsp confectioners' sugar

For Decorations

Red decorating frosting
White decorating frosting
3 oz green fondant

Instructions

Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
In a bowl, mix together chocolate cake mix, canola oil, and 2 eggs. Wrap the bowl with plastic wrap and chill for 30 minutes.
Remove from the refrigerator and preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.
Roll each cookie into 1 inch spheres and coat with granulated sugar, followed by the powdered sugar. Place on cookie sheet, about 1-2 inches apart.
Bake for 9 to 12 minutes and allow to cool completely before decorating.
To decorate, use a round frosting tip to create 2-3 circles on each cookie.
Roll 36 small spheres out of your green fondant. Flatten the fondant spheres, giving each a pointed end. Use scissors to cut out a leafy-edge.
On the back of each fondant leaf, frost out a bit of white decorating frosting. Secure 2 on each cookie. Serve and enjoy!

Nutrition

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Keyword: christmas bake, christmas cookies, cookies, holly crinkle cookies

Servings: cookies

Calories: 164kcal

Chocolate crinkle cookies with holly berry decorations.

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If you enjoyed these Christmas chocolate crinkle cookies, here are some more easy cookie recipes you should try next.

23 Comments

These cookies look delicious. Using a chocolate cake mix makes it easy to make these cookies. Thinking I could use different cake mixes for different flavors.

Those look absolutely gorgeous! I love crinkle cookies it brings me back to my childhood when my grandma would make cookies for me. I love what you did with these!

Yep, these are very cute cookies!

The little berry leaf on top takes it to the next level. These are a cute cookie, and they look so tasty!

You would be a great addition to any cookie exchange. These look so good and i would try and make them before the season is over.

I’ve always wanted to try making these cookies. They would be so much fun to bring to a holiday party.

Yum, I love how these turned out. They sound amazing. And they look pretty. It’s been ages since I’ve had crinkle cookies.

What a delicious collection of cookie recipes. We’re not doing a Christmas cookie holiday swap this year as we’ll be out of the country during the holidays but I am sharing this post with my friends and bookmarking so I can make some when we return.

Oh these are cute. I can’ believe I’ve never made a crinkle cookie before…that’ll have to change this year.

These cookies are so darling and elegant. The holly decoration is so unique and came out great!

These are so pretty Lisa! I love the little icing holly berries!

I make these too! They’re so good and everyone in my family enjoys them. Your pictures are beautiful.

Amazing and so cute! Thanks for the recipe!

Ok, now I want some cookies. Those looks so yummy and so festive too!

I see these cookies every Christmas and always wanted to try them, now I have the recipe! Thanks for sharing, they look delish.

Looks delicious and looks like it is easy to make. Your recipe is something any person like me could follow. Thanks

I like a good crinkle cookie. And I love that these are made from simple ingredients that I have on hand like cake mix. I want to try to make these for the school’s holiday party.

Those are incredibly cute. I love crinkle cookies (second only to snickerdoodles!) and I want to make some that look like yours!

You have selected some top of the top Christmas cookies for exchanging this year. I have a group of gals we host a cookie exchange every year and this is going to be one of my baking sessions this year

These are some of my favorite Christmas Cookies to make. I love how you dressed them up for the holidays!

These cookies almost look too good to eat! Almost! I love the decorations on top!

All of these cookies look so yummy!! I want to try them but they would be so bad for my diet…LOL!!

These looks so delicious!!

Holly Crinkle Cookies