Buttery, tender almond-vanilla shortbread meets raspberry jam—these raspberry almond thumbprint cookies are a classic for a reason. With their melt-in-your-mouth texture, perfectly paired sweet flavors, and pretty presentation, it’s hard to believe you only need 7 ingredients for the dough and 1 bowl to make them!
I originally published this recipe in 2013, and it now features updated photos, added success tips, and a revised shaping method for even better results.
If there’s one cookie that feels like a holiday classic and a year-round treat, it’s this one.
Why You’ll Love These Thumbprint Cookies
- Soft, melt-in-your-mouth texture: The dough is buttery and delicate, yet sturdy enough to hold a jam filling.
- Bright fruit flavor: Raspberry jam in each indentation brings a vibrant, flavorful contrast to the sweet almond-kissed cookie.
- Short ingredient list: These cookies make the cut for my list of recipes requiring 8 ingredients or less!
- 1-bowl cookie dough: An electric mixer and 1 bowl is all you need to make the dough!
- Egg-free baking recipe: Whether you have an allergy or are simply out of eggs, these cookies don’t require any.
These raspberry almond thumbprints are perfect for cookie exchanges, gifting, or simply enjoying with a cup of tea. And on a holiday dessert platter, these cookies stand out like little jewels!
Ingredients You Need & Why
- Butter: Unsalted butter is the foundation of shortbread’s rich, tender texture. Because butter carries the flavor here, make sure it’s properly softened to room temperature so it creams smoothly with the sugar.
- Sugar: Granulated sugar sweetens the dough and helps it hold structure, giving the cookies a soft, tender bite without ever turning cakey.
- Vanilla: A splash of vanilla rounds out the flavor and complements the raspberry jam.
- Almond Extract: The star of the show! I mean, the dough! 😉 Almond extract adds a warm, bakery-style aroma that pairs beautifully with berry preserves.
- Salt: Balances the sweet.
- Flour: All-purpose flour forms the base of this egg-free cookie. It absorbs the butter and creates a dough that’s soft but not sticky, perfect for shaping.
- Raspberry Jam: Use a thick, high-quality raspberry jam or preserves. Seeded or seedless both work—choose your preference. Other flavors such as strawberry, apricot, or blackberry also work wonderfully.
Optional Icing: For a pretty finish, whisk together confectioners’ sugar with a splash of milk (or half-and-half, or cream). A little almond or vanilla extract is lovely here, too.
Almond Shortbread Dough
Typical shortbread cookies are made up of one part sugar, two parts butter, and three parts flour. Some recipes have eggs, some don’t. Some recipes have chemical leavening agents, some don’t.
My shortbread cookie dough is just sugar-butter-flour with a little salt, plus almond and vanilla extracts. I like to use a variation of today’s dough for wedge-shaped shortbread cookies. The dough is pretty easy to work with and is versatile for lots of different shapes of cookies.
After you mix up the dough, it will be quite soft and buttery. Shortbread cookies are supposed to be buttery, so if the dough feels extra buttery—you’re on the right track.
Shaping Raspberry Almond Thumbprint Cookies
Here’s what’s new: Roll and indent the cookie dough before chilling. Chilling the shaped dough prevents spreading and makes it much easier to handle. Previously, the dough was chilled as a whole, which made shaping trickier.
Roll the dough into balls, about 1 Tablespoon of dough (20g) each. Make sure they’re smooth so they bake evenly.
Make the indentation. Press your thumb into each ball. The dough may crack slightly, so just use your fingers to smooth the edges together.
Chill the shaped dough. Place the indented dough balls on a lined baking sheet or large plate and refrigerate for at least 4 hours. Once chilled, transfer them to fresh baking sheets with space between each cookie.
Fill each with about 1/2 teaspoon of raspberry jam per cookie. Feel free to swap in another jam or preserves.
Then it’s time to bake. The cookies will puff up and spread just a bit. Avoid overbaking; the bottoms should be pale with only the faintest hint of browning.
Success Tip: Use light-colored baking sheets for these cookies. Dark metal conducts heat faster and contributes to browning. If you bake these light-colored cookies on a dark baking sheet (even if it’s lined!), the bottoms will over-brown. Same rule applies for these peppermint meltaway cookies.
The Icing on the Cookie
Now… the creamy icing! Whisk together confectioners’ sugar and milk. Feel free to add a bit of almond or vanilla extract to the mix as well. Drizzle the icing onto each cookie.
This recipe comes together beautifully because the buttery shortbread (with its hints of vanilla and almond) is mellow yet rich, the raspberry jam adds brightness and tang, and the glaze ties it all together. They’ve been a trusted go-to for more than a decade, and once you taste them, you’ll understand why.
More Thumbprint Cookies
- Lemon Thumbprint Cookies
- Peanut Butter Jam Thumbprints
- Chocolate Peppermint Thumbprints
- Apricot Cream Cheese Thumbprint Cookies
- Caramel Apple Spice Thumbprints
This recipe is part of my annual cookie countdown called Sally’s Cookie Palooza. It’s the biggest, most delicious event of the year! Browse dozens of cookie recipes over on the Sally’s Cookie Palooza page.
Raspberry Almond Thumbprint Cookies
- Prep Time: 4 hours, 45 minutes
- Cook Time: 14 minutes
- Total Time: 4 hours 59 minutes
- Yield: 30-36 cookies
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
Soft, buttery almond shortbread cookies filled with sweet raspberry jam. These easy, egg-free thumbprint cookies come together in 1 bowl and bake into tender, melt-in-your-mouth treats perfect for the holidays or any time of year. See Note below about keeping the dough cold at all times, to help prevent over-spreading.
Ingredients
Cookies
- 1 cup (16 Tbsp; 226g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 2/3 cup (133g) granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 2 and 1/4 cups (281g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1/2 cup (160g) raspberry jam*
Icing
- 1 cup (120g) confectioners’ sugar
- 1–2 Tablespoons (15–30g/ml) heavy cream, half-and-half, or milk
- optional: 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla or almond extract
Instructions
- Make the cookies: Using a handheld or stand mixer with a paddle attachment, beat the butter on high speed until creamy, about 1 minute. Switch mixer to medium speed and add the the sugar, vanilla, and almond extracts. Scrape down the sides and the bottom of the bowl as needed. Add the salt and flour. Turn the mixer on low and slowly beat until a very soft dough is formed. If the dough seems too sticky for rolling, beat in another Tablespoon of flour.
- Shape the cookies: Line a baking sheet or plate with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper. Scoop and roll the dough, about a Tablespoon (18–20g) each, into balls, and place on the prepared baking sheet. Press an indentation with your thumb in each ball. The dough may crack slightly when you press your thumb into it. Simply smooth it out with your fingers if you can.
- Place the baking sheet with the thumbprint cookies in the refrigerator and chill until firm, at least 4 hours.
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Line large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
- Place the cookies on the prepared baking sheets, spacing them 2–3 inches apart, about 12 cookies per baking sheet. Fill each cookie with a scant 1/2 teaspoon of jam.
- Bake the shortbread thumbprint cookies for 13–15 minutes, or until very lightly browned on the edges. The cookies will puff up and spread slightly. Do not overbake. Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack. Allow to cool for at least 30 minutes before glazing.
- Make the icing: Whisk the icing ingredients together until smooth. Add more liquid to thin out or add more confectioners’ sugar to thicken to your desired consistency. Drizzle over cookies. Icing will set after about 1 hour.
- Store cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 2 days, or in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Make Ahead & Freezing Instructions: Shaped shortbread dough (rolled and indented) can be frozen for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator, and then continue with step 4. Baked cookies (with or without icing) can be frozen for up to 3 months. Thaw at room temperature or in the refrigerator.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand) | Baking Sheets | Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Paper | Cooling Rack | Glass Mixing Bowl | Whisk
- Jam: Use a thick, high-quality raspberry jam or preserves. Seeded or seedless both work—choose your preference. Other flavors such as strawberry, apricot, or blackberry also work wonderfully.
- Cold Dough: The shaped cookie dough must stay cold and firm before baking. After rolling and adding the thumbprint, chill the shaped dough for at least 4 hours (or up to 3 days). If the dough softens as you fill with jam, simply return the shaped cookies to the refrigerator to firm up again. When baking in batches, keep the remaining shaped cookies in the refrigerator while the first batch bakes. You can also shape and indent a second tray, refrigerate it, and bake it right after the first.
Reader Comments and Reviews
Why did my cookies melt into thin pancakes? I weighed out all of the ingredients and chilled for four hours.
Hi Kristine, we’re happy to help troubleshoot. Was your butter a bit too warm to start with? Here’s more on what room temperature butter really means (it may be cooler than you think!). If the butter is too warm, the cookies will over spread. It’s also very important that the shaped cookie dough stay cold and firm before baking. After rolling and adding the thumbprint, chill the shaped dough for at least 4 hours (or up to 3 days). If the dough softens as you fill with jam, simply return the shaped cookies to the refrigerator to firm up again. When baking in batches, keep the remaining shaped cookies in the refrigerator while the first batch bakes. You can also shape and indent a second tray, refrigerate it, and bake it right after the first. Hope this helps for your next batch!
This is the third year I’ve made these at Christmas. They are wonderful!
Can I use almond paste instead of almond extract for the Raspberry Almond Thumbprint cookies?
Hi Patricia! Almond extract is really best for these cookies.
Thank you for this wonderful recipe
Recipe requires too much flour. Just 2 cups makes them turn out perfect. 2 1/4 cup makes them way too crumbly and they fall apart. Other than changing that, everything about this cookie is great!
This is my favorite recipe for thumbprints!! Quick question, I normally have bleached all-purpose flour, but this year have an abundance of unbleached APF. Do you think this is ok to use for this recipe?
Hi Kathryn, yes absolutely. That is what we typically use.
Hi Sally…I’d like to try making these for my holiday cookie tray and was wondering if I could use raspberry jelly instead of jam? I seem to have an abundance of jelly but no jam! Thanks!
Should be fine, Judy!
Hi Sally. These look like a fun and easy cookie to share with neighbors at an upcoming community event using both raspberry and apricot preserves, yum! Since I’ll be making several dozen, I need to make the dough the day before I bake them. Should I leave the shaped dough on a tray ‘uncovered’ in the fridge or should I cover them with plastic wrap before putting them into the fridge for about 24 hours? I read somewhere that getting them not to crack is kind of a science re how cold the cookies should or shouldn’t be when baking. Any thoughts on that? Since I’m serving to neighbors and the community, I want them to look perfect. Thanks!
Hi Karen, if chilling for about 24 hours, we would lightly cover the dough. Hope the cookies are a hit!
Can I make dough ahead and refrigerate? Then roll into balls the next day?
Hi Nancy, no, we do not recommend that order. After chilling as a whole, the dough is extremely firm and impossible to scoop. Shape the dough while it’s still pliable, before chilling.
I would like to add powdered freeze dried raspberries to this dough to make it pink (probably 85g), do you have a suggestion for how I should adjust the amount of butter to make up for the extra dry ingredients? Thank you!!
Hi Lara, I don’t think you should have to adjust the butter. You can very slightly reduce the flour (not by 85g though) to make room for the freeze-dried raspberry powder. The powder won’t absorb liquid like flour does, so you should only maybe have to reduce it by a Tablespoon or 2. Let us know how your cookies turn out!
Hi Sally! Do you think I can skip the almond extract? My family and friends are not big fans of the almond flavor, so I was wondering if I can use more vanilla?
Hi Shreya, Yes you can just skip the almond extract, or add more vanilla in its place.
Hi Sally !
Thank you for always sharing amazing recipes. I have just made this cookies, while they do smell heavenly, they spread out too much and the jam kind of melted into the cookie dough which was strange!
I don’t know what did I do wrong because I put the cookies into the oven straight from the fridge so they were completely cold.
Do you have any advice?
Hi Negin, excess spreading and the jam melting into the dough usually point to one of a few things. The most common culprit is the butter-to-flour ratio being off. If the flour was under-measured even slightly (very easy to do with cups!), the dough can be too soft and spread more than expected. Make sure you’re spooning and leveling the flour or, even better, weighing it for accuracy. If you did weigh it, and you want to try the cookies again, add another 15-30g to help the dough firm up. Another possibility is that the jam was too thin or runny; thicker jams or preserves hold their shape much better during baking. I hope this helps troubleshoot for next time!
I made these for a family party, and they were a big hit. They were a little more time consuming than other types of cookies due to the 4+ hours in the freezer, but the extra effort was worth it. I will definitely make these again.
Do you think I could make these as long strips/ribbons, which are cut into cookies after baking? I have a recipe like that (Raspberry Ribbons) but yours sounds delicious and I’d love to try them. I’m just looking for a different cookie shape!
Hi Laurie! You can certainly experiment with shaping, but this particular dough is designed for individual thumbprints rather than long ribbons. It’s a softer, more delicate dough that spreads and rises in a way that may cause long strips to lose their shape or bake unevenly. If you do experiment, I’d love to hear how it goes!
I’m going to make these, but I’m wondering how successful they would be if I replaced some of the all-purpose flour with Almond flour. I saw a recipe that had mostly almond flour, and a smaller amount of all-purpose flour, and of course, I can’t find it now. I love your recipes, and have never had one turn out bad!
Hi Cathy! We don’t recommend it—almond flour has very different baking properties than all-purpose flour, so it isn’t necessarily always a 1:1 swap. Best to stick with all-purpose flour here!
Hello – I wonder if I have done something incorrectly….. The cookies were lovely however, they spread quite a bit in the oven, more than in your picture and they also didn’t taste much of almond.
Do you have any advice?x
Hi Amy, we’re happy to help troubleshoot. Was your butter a bit too warm to start with? Here’s more on what room temperature butter really means (it may be cooler than you think!). If the butter is too warm, the cookies will over spread. It’s also very important that the shaped cookie dough stay cold and firm before baking. After rolling and adding the thumbprint, chill the shaped dough for at least 4 hours (or up to 3 days). If the dough softens as you fill with jam, simply return the shaped cookies to the refrigerator to firm up again. When baking in batches, keep the remaining shaped cookies in the refrigerator while the first batch bakes. You can also shape and indent a second tray, refrigerate it, and bake it right after the first. Hope this helps for your next batch!
I had the exact same issue. Not a novice baker by any means, followed the recipe to a T, chilled my dough for nearly 6 hours so they went in the oven really firm and cold but they still spread a lot and the edges were really crispy
Hello,
Is there anything left out of this recipe. I am doubling it and mixing it up and it is very very dry and crumbly
Hi Sandra! The recipe is correct. Dry dough is usually caused by too much flour in the dough. How did you measure the flour? Make sure to spoon and level (instead of scooping) to avoid packing in too much flour into your measuring cups – or use a kitchen scale. You can read more about properly measuring baking ingredients in this post.
Could you make a sugar plum version of these with plum jam and some spices? How much cinnamon would you recommend ?
Hi Kelly, we’re sure you could but have not tested anything. Let us know what you try!
Is either freezer method more successful than the other? I’m making some for now and freezing some for cookie tins to be mailed later this month.
Hi SV, either method works great! We tend to prefer freezing the dough so we can have freshly baked cookies at any time, but freezing the baked cookies works well, too.
Can I use homemade raspberry jam?
Absolutely!
I bake these every year at Christmas and they are among the first to go. Absolutely delicious!
Thank you for the delicious recipe. Maybe it’s my ingredients or just my over-mixing with the mixer, but my dough is always so dry and crumbly (similar to brown sugar in texture). I found that I have to roll the dough balls a lot in my warm hands to activate the fat so that it holds together well enough for my thumb not to crack it. Once I get the balls to the right consistency with my hands, they turn out perfect!
Same happened to me and I had to toss the whole batch. Tried again and left out the 1/4 cup flour and they were perfect.
Other similar recipes had max 2 cups, so tried that and was much better.
Hi, Sally.This recipe looks amazing!!! Just wondering can I double this recipe or do I need to make two separate batches? Thank you!
Hi Brianne, yes, you can double this recipe, but just keep in mind that the dough gets a bit heavy for some mixers. If your mixer struggles, you can finish bringing the dough together with a spatula or by hand. Otherwise, doubling works great—just scrape down the bowl a few times so everything mixes evenly. Enjoy!
Can you use vanilla e tract instead of almond?
You can just skip the almond extract, or add more vanilla in its place.
Is there any way that these cookies can be made with real almonds instead of almond extract? Thanks!
Hi Melanie, you could try rolling the balls, before making the thumbprint, in very finely chopped almonds. If you’d like to add almonds to the dough, it would require some testing as the chopped nuts could dry it out. I also have this linzer cookie recipe you can make with almonds if you are interested.
Thoughts on doing this with a 3 year old (we bake together quite a bit)? I was thinking she might like to make the thumbprints
Hi Hannah, That’s a great idea for them to help with the thumbprints, especially if you bake together often. Enjoy!
I love these, from the 2013 version – my husband officially does not like jam or shortbread, but somehow finished the last five cookies while he was reading and asked if there is more besides! Enjoy!
One of my favorite Sally recipes of all time! And that’s saying something because all of her recipes are amazing. I make these every holiday season!