Cookie swaps are a relatively new concept to me. While I often baked cookies for family and friends in Texas, I don’t remember anyone ever getting together to swap what we’d baked. Certainly it never happened in England, I think I was one of the few people I knew that baked or cooked from scratch at all.

When I saw Julie from The Little Kitchen tweet that they were throwing together a virtual swap, amongst food bloggers, I thought, “How fun!” and immediately signed up.

You can sign up for next year now!

Now, I don’t know about you, but in the last few years, one of my favorite things about when the holidays roll around is Hershey’s seasonal Candy Cane Kisses. I actually buy up 5 or 6 bags and freeze them, just so I can have my favorite white chocolate + peppermint combination year ’round.

I haven’t figured out yet the best way to chop these guys up into chip-sized morsels, though a food processor works pretty well. I’ve also tried it by hand with a knife (tedious) and even with a meat tenderizer (cathartic, but again, tedious). So far, a food processor with a shredding blade works best.

Next time I make these guys, I think I’m going to bump up the white chocolate quotient by adding a cup of white chocolate chips, but I’m really pleased with how they turned out. The addition of holiday non pariels mimics the slight crunch in the Candy Cane Kisses.

The peppermint flavor from the Kisses combines so well with the vanilla sugar cookie base, it simply makes for a delicious, buttery, minty cookie.

So far I have received two batches of cookies, wonderful Snickers Peanut Butter Cookies from Nutmeg Nanny. Next to arrive were beautiful Eggnog Cookies from Hannah. Miss PostLady is hopefully bringing me a surprise from Loy at From Grandma Loy’s Kitchen today. I can’t wait to see what they are!

Are you getting excited for the holidays yet?!

[wpurp-searchable-recipe]Candy Cane Kiss Cookies – – – [/wpurp-searchable-recipe]