Easy Herbal Cookie Recipes: Over-the-Top Cookie Swap

Enlarge Image Image Gallery To make these Anise-Scented Sugar Cookie trees, make several sizes of the star-shaped cookies. Then stack, rotating and alternating the stars' points and using icing to adhere cookies as you stack. To finish, decorate with dragee "ornaments" adhered with icing. Susan Jackson

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For most of us, the holidays are all about giving back — about sharing the things that we love to do or make with those who have supported us throughout the year. As a pastry chef and event designer, my favorite gifts to give are parties that put a high priority on delicious food.

Whether you are throwing an elaborate holiday get-together or simply baking up tins of cookies for friends and neighbors, I hope these recipes and images inspire you this season. For our little gathering, the centerpiece, my labor of love, was a completely edible composition of Anise-Scented Sugar Cookie trees — star-shaped cookies stacked tall on cut-glass candlesticks — surrounded by a frosty landscape of powdered sugar, rock candy and peppermint-infused truffles swathed in white chocolate. We threaded frosted gingerbread angels and stars with satin ribbon and hung them on the crystal chandelier for a hint of heaven above the forest. Pastry blenders outfitted with recipe cards and real gingerbread boxes filled with leftover cookies were the icing on this luscious treat.

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