Our homemade Christmas Mints recipe is a fun way to add a festive flair to your holiday party table with a plateful of brightly colored homemade peppermint Christmas candy.
Made in minutes using only a handful of ingredients (including cream cheese, corn syrup, and powdered sugar), these no-bake creamy, buttery bites taste even better than store-bought pepper mint patties.
Christmas Cream Cheese Mints
Making Christmas Mints at home is so easy and makes the most delicious melt-in-your-mouth mini desserts from cream cheese, butter, sugar, corn syrup, and mint extract.
Perfect for holiday platters, hostess gifts, seasonal parties, or serving after supper, this Christmas mint candy is even softer and creamier than the name-brand buttermints.
Our peppermint candy recipe requires no cooking and creates a big batch of butter mint dough that you simply color, roll into logs, cut into pieces, coat in sugar, and flatten with a fork.
Although the mints need 24 hours to dry, they develop a crisp outer shell with a creamy mint-flavored middle that makes it well worth the wait!
Why We Love This Homemade Mints Recipe
- Quick and easy to make.
- Uses simple kitchen staple ingredients.
- Delicious sweet treats taste light and crisp with a buttery richness and a refreshing minty flavor.
- Make-ahead recipe for peppermint candy is perfect for holiday entertaining.
- Great for gifting to teachers and friends and a pretty addition to cookie trays and dessert platters.
More Easy Christmas Recipes
Ingredients
- Granulated sugar
- Cream cheese
- Unsalted butter
- Light/clear corn syrup: I used Karo brand for this recipe.
- Peppermint extract
- Powdered sugar
- Green liquid or gel food coloring
- Red liquid or gel food coloring
Substitutions and Additions
- Use Other Extracts: You can use other extract flavors if you aren’t a fan of mint. Try cherry or strawberry flavoring for the red mints; vanilla for the white mints, and lime for the green.
- Decorate Or Dip: Feel free to add sprinkles to the dough for an extra festive flair. You can also roll the dough in crushed candy canes or dip your candies in melting chocolate to create a homemade York Peppermint Patty.
- Customize Your Candy: These little mints can be colored to match a party theme or other holiday celebration. Use pastel colors for Easter and baby showers; use gold, silver and white for weddings and anniversary parties; use orange for Halloween; make them multi-colored for birthdays.
How to Make Christmas Mints
- Make The Dough: Beat together the cream cheese, butter, corn syrup, and peppermint extract until smooth. Add the powdered sugar, ½ cup at a time, and mix until fully incorporated.
Pro Tip: If your dough becomes too thick, you may need to switch to a spatula or wooden spoon and finish mixing the dough by hand. - Divide The Dough: Place the dough onto powdered sugar-covered parchment paper and divide it into three equal parts. Create a shallow well in the center of two of the dough balls and add red food coloring to one, green food coloring to the second, and leave the third one white.
- Kneed: Knead the red and green dough to distribute the food coloring.
Pro Tip: You will need to add up to an additional ¼ cup of powdered sugar as you knead because the liquid food coloring will make your dough sticky. You may need to knead your white dough with a tablespoon or 2 of additional powdered sugar. - Roll: Roll each dough ball into a rope about 18 inches long and 1 inch thick. Slice each rope into ½-inch pieces. Then, roll each piece in the palm of your hand to make little balls.
- Coat: Toss each dough ball in a bowl of sugar to coat and place them onto the prepared baking tray.
- Flatten With A Fork: Press the Christmas peppermint patties into little discs so that the tines of the fork leave a pretty striped pattern on the tops.
- Sit, Set, and Serve: Allow the Christmas peppermint patties to sit out at room temperature, on the tray, for up to 24 hours before you place them onto a platter to serve. Enjoy!
Tip From Our Recipe Developer
- If you want a deeper color, you can add up to ½ teaspoon of liquid food coloring.
- You may need to add more powdered sugar to the mixture to get your peppermint patty dough to be the right consistency. You do not want it too stiff, but it should not be sticky.
- Gel food coloring works excellent for these candies because their colors are often more vibrant and intense without adding too much moisture to the dough. They are also safe for people with nut allergies.
Storage
- To Store: These Christmas Mints should be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator to keep them fresh. They’ll last up to 2 weeks chilled.
- To Freeze: If you’re making them ahead or want to store them longer, you can freeze them in a freezer-safe container for up to 3 months. Just let them thaw in the fridge before serving!
Other Easy Christmas Recipes
- Melted Snowman Chocolate Bark
- Dirty Snowmen
- Peppermint Snowball Cookies
- Ice Cream Cone Christmas Trees
- Grinch Pretzels
- Ornament Oreo Truffles
- Butter Mints
- Chocolate Christmas Candy
- Christmas Puppy Chow
- Christmas Cherry Bombs
Christmas Mints
Serves — 100
This Christmas Mints recipe requires no cooking and is easy to make using a few kitchen staple ingredients. Creamy, buttery, and beautifully bright, these colorful candies are perfect for holiday parties and gift giving.
Prep Time 15 minutes
Rest Time 1 hour
Total Time 1 hour 15 minutes
Video
Ingredients
- ⅓ cup granulated sugar
- 4 ounces cream cheese room temperature
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter room temperature
- 2 tablespoons light/clear corn syrup (I used Karo brand)
- 1 teaspoon peppermint extract
- 4¼-5 cups powdered sugar divided
- 6 drops green liquid food coloring
- 6 drops red liquid food coloring
Instructions
- Line a large rimmed baking tray with parchment paper. Place the granulated sugar into a small bowl. Set aside.
- In a large mixing bowl with a handheld mixer on low speed, beat the cream cheese, unsalted butter, light corn syrup, and peppermint extract for 1 minute or until smooth.
- Slowly add 4¼ cups powdered sugar, ½ cup at a time, to the bowl with the mixer on low. Once you get close to incorporating all of the powdered sugar, your dough will be so thick that you may need to switch to a spatula or wooden spoon and finish mixing the dough by hand.
- Lay out a piece of parchment paper onto a clean counter and sprinkle ¼ cup of the remaining powdered sugar onto the parchment paper, then turn out your dough onto the parchment paper.
- Divide the dough into three equal parts. Create a shallow well in the center of two of the dough balls. In the first dough ball, add the red food coloring. Add the green food coloring to the second dough ball, and your last dough ball will remain white.
- Carefully knead your red dough ball to evenly distribute the food coloring. You will need to add up to an additional ¼ cup of powdered sugar as you knead because the liquid food coloring will make your dough sticky. Repeat with the green dough ball. You may need to knead your white dough just a little with a tablespoon or 2 of additional powdered sugar. **The amount of extra powdered sugar you need for kneading depends on how wet/sticky your dough is. If the temperature is very warm, you may need more, or if very cold, you may need less. Don’t add too much powdered sugar at once. Remember, you can always add more, but you can’t take it away.**
- Once all your Christmas peppermint patty dough balls have been colored and kneaded, roll each dough ball into a rope about 18 inches long (it should be about 1 inch thick).
- Make ½-inch slices, starting at one end, until you have cut the entire rope into ½-inch pieces. Repeat with the remaining dough ropes.
- Roll all the pieces of peppermint dough in the palm of your hand to make little balls. Set aside.
- Drop 2-3 dough balls into the small bowl of granulated sugar and toss to coat. Place them onto the prepared baking tray. Repeat until all the dough balls are coated and on the baking tray.
- Using the tip of a fork, lightly press the Christmas peppermint patties into little discs. The tines of the fork will leave a pretty striped pattern on the tops of each peppermint patty.
- Allow the Christmas peppermint patties to sit out at room temperature, on the tray, for up to 24 hours before you place them onto a platter to serve. This allows them to dry and set up.
Jenn’s Notes
Yields: approximately 100 peppermint candies
Storage:
These Christmas Mints should be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator to keep them fresh. They’ll last up to 2 weeks chilled. If you’re making them ahead or want to store them longer, you can freeze them in a freezer-safe container for up to 3 months. Just let them thaw in the fridge before serving!
Tips:
- If you want a deeper color, you can add up to ½ teaspoon of liquid food coloring.
- You may need to add more powdered sugar to the mixture to get your peppermint patty dough to be the right consistency. You do not want it too stiff, but it should not be sticky.
- Gel food coloring works great for these candies because their colors are often more vibrant and intense without adding too much moisture to the dough. They are also are safe for people with nut allergies.
Nutrition Info
Calories: 27kcal | Carbohydrates: 6g | Protein: 0.2g | Fat: 0.2g | Saturated Fat: 0.2g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 0.01g | Monounsaturated Fat: 0.1g | Trans Fat: 0.01g | Cholesterol: 1mg | Sodium: 8mg | Potassium: 3mg | Sugar: 6g | Vitamin A: 8IU | Calcium: 4mg | Iron: 0.01mg
As someone else had said, shouldn’t they be kept in the fridge and not the counter for 24 hrs since it has cream cheese in it?
Thank you for catching that. Yes, they should be stored in the fridge or freezer. I have updated that post!
Can you freeze these mints
What a treat and easy too!
Can these mints be frozen & if so, for how long ?
Yes, you can freeze them! Place them in an airtight container (you may want some parchment paper between layers) for up to 2 months.
Excellent for children to help
10 my Aunt Nat use to make these every year and inter them into the fair me and my cousin Anita use to love them as children we are both 71 now hope to get them to share.
These look good, but I don’t like cream cheese. Wondering how you have a Christmas mint candy recipe without the cheese? Or any kind of cheese (I don’t like cheese, period.)
Thank you 😊
I don’t care for cream cheese either but love these mints. I don’t taste cream cheese at all.
I have made these mints for many years but have never added corn syrup. They work great in candy molds for bridal showers or baby showers.