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National Cookie Exchange Day

Food · Family · December 22

A day for the cookie exchange, where bakers trade batches so everyone goes home with a tin full of different cookies.

National Cookie Exchange Day falls on Tuesday, December 22, 2026. That is 56 days away.

A cookie exchange works on a simple trade. Each person bakes a big batch of one kind of cookie, brings it to a gathering, and leaves with an assortment made by everyone else. One afternoon of baking turns into a dozen varieties.

The usual setup is a table lined with plates and tins. Guests walk along it with an empty container and pick a few of each. Some groups set a number, like six dozen per baker, so the math works out. Others ask people to bring the recipe on a card, which means the best cookie of the evening can be made again at home.

The mix is the appeal. One person brings sugar cookies with careful icing, another brings oatmeal raisin, someone else brings a family recipe nobody can quite pronounce. Families often use these swaps to pass along old recipes, and children get to roll, cut and decorate with a grown up nearby.

Sturdy cookies travel best. Shortbread, gingersnaps and drop cookies hold up in a stacked tin, while very soft or cream filled ones can smudge their neighbors. Bakers who plan ahead layer each kind between sheets of wax paper.

The empty tin you arrive with is the one that matters most. Bring one with room to spare.

Ways to celebrate

• Invite a few friends or neighbors to swap batches of homemade cookies.
• Bake a family recipe and write it on cards to share.
• Decorate sugar cookies with kids before trading them.
• Pack a mixed tin of swapped cookies for someone nearby.

Dates

All national days on December 22

Also on December 22

• National Date Nut Bread Day

Categories: Food daysFamily days