BEST Pizzelle Recipe (Italian Waffle Cookies) - Fresh April Flours (2024)

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Thin Italian waffle cookies featuring optional anise flavoring for an authentic Italian treat. Perfect with a cup of coffee or espresso and a family favorite at Christmas time. Dust with powdered sugar for an extra sweet touch!

If you’re anything like me (the granddaughter of Italian immigrants), your mouth starts to water at the thought of eating pizzelle.

As soon as I hear the word, I’m immediately transported back to my grandparents’ house in Hershey, PA where we always had stacks and stacks of these pizzelle at the Christmas spread alongside family favorites such as sfratti, spaghetti with meat sauce, and a whole slew of classic Italian staples.

When Matt and I started dating, I learned quickly that his family also adores a classic pizzelle recipe, and there was a near fist fight over the last one at the first Feast of The Seven Fishes celebration I attended.

If you’re intrigued by Italian recipes or traditional Italian cookies, you would probably be happy to hear that I’ve shared a few of my favorites over the years. These include my recipes for traditional anise biscotti, Italian anise bread, sfratti (honey walnut cookie sticks), and most recently these pignoli cookies.

Classic Italian pizzelles are made using a special iron with intricate designs. They are most often thin and crispy, although some people prefer their pizzelle a little thicker and therefore chewier.

These cookies are popular all year long, but become even more popular during any one of the many holidays throughout the year (we also often have them at Easter holidays!). But during Christmas? That’s the absolute peak of pizzelle making and eating season.

And is it any wonder? Traditional Italian pizzelle are just as beautiful as they are delicious, making them the perfect gift or the perfect cookie to bring along to a cookie exchange or party. I personally enjoy them with a steamy cup of coffee or espresso (and yes, I dunk– I can’t resist!).

You basically need some flour (it’s very important to measure properly), baking powder, salt, sugar, unsalted butter, eggs, and vanilla. See? Easy peasy.

Then if you’re going the traditional route (Italian pizzelle cookie recipes typically have anise) you’ll need some of that extract and the anise seeds I mentioned earlier. It really shouldn’t be any trouble to find them– they are easy to get at your local grocery store or online.

They are a treasured item in Italian households, and can be found both at Italian markets and online– whichever you prefer! Unfortunately, there isn’t really a way to make proper pizzelle without one, but I promise you that they are definitely worth the small investment.

1. To get started on the best pizzelle recipe, make sure your pizzelle iron is plugged in and turned on. We’ll let it preheat while we mix up the batter, that way it will be ready to go when we need it.
2. Then add your flour, anise seed (if using), baking powder, and salt to a small bowl. Give it a little whisk to combine and then set aside.
3. Add the sugar, melted butter, eggs, vanilla extract, and anise extract (if using) to a medium-sized bowl and whisk everything together until smooth.
4. Finally, pour the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Use a silicone spatula to fold everything together, mixing until the dry ingredients are fully incorporated into the wet ones. Just be super careful not to over-mix!

The batter will be quite thick (just a bit thinner than regular cookie dough), which can be surprising since the cookie itself is so thin. You would think it would be a thin, pancake-like batter, but nope!

I like to use a cookie scoop (this #50 cookie scoopis my standby) to portion and drop the batter into the center of each section of your pizzelle iron. You want to work quickly here, but you still need to be careful to get the perfect press.

Then cook the pizzelles according to the instructions given in the manual for your iron. In my experience, that ranges from about 30 to 90 seconds.

I used about a tablespoon of dough for each cookie, which I think is pretty standard for the majority of pizzelle irons. But I want to make sure that you check the instructions of your particular model and see what they say– some are larger and may require more dough.

If all else fails and you can’t find your manual, you can always use the first few pizzelles to test out the amount of dough and time required. I assure you, they will at the very least be tasty mistakes.

Then, once your cookies are done cooking, remove them from the iron and place them in a single layer on a wire cooling rack or a parchment-lined baking sheet. They will still be quite soft but will stiffen after they cool down. Just keep them nice and flat so they set up that way too.

Once your cookies are completely cooled remove any rough edges (more on that in a minute), and then either store them for later or dust them with powdered sugar and serve them immediately.

Pizzelle Cookies Recipe Variations

Personally? I really despise licorice. As in I make Matt, whose favorite candy is Good & Plenty, eat that favorite in a different room. True story.

But anise flavor? It’s a totally different level of “licorice flavor,” and Italian anise bread is one of my favorite recipes ever. You be the judge, but I promise, if you don’t like licorice, there is a chance you could still like anise!

And while I’m in favor of adding anise oil and seed because it’s traditional, it is an optional ingredient. You don’t even need to find anything to replace it with– just leave out both the anise seed and anise extract and you’re good to go.

Although… You do know how much I love almond extract. You could easily turn these into almond pizzelle with a little almond extract.

Hey, if you have some licorice lovers in your crew you could always divide the dough in half and add anise to one portion and leave it out of the second portion. It’s all about compromise, right?

This rolled batter typically contains either additional flour, chilling the dough, or both. This makes the dough firm enough to handle and roll between the palms, similar to what you would do for a classic cookie recipe (like my pecan chocolate chip cookies).

I have personally never made this style, but I have seen it done, and it seems like it could be an efficient way of making lots of pizzelle for gifting, parties, etc.

But as for me? I’m sticking to the traditional wet batter that forms crispy, perfectly browned cookies every single time. Hey, if it’s not broken, what is there to fix?

Best Pizzelle Recipe FAQs

If you would prefer an even longer storage time, you can actually freeze pizzelle cookies. They freeze super well, lasting for up to 3 months. Just thaw them at room temperature before you’re ready to serve.

Are you thinking of making this Italian pizzelle cookie recipe for a cookie exchange or a delicious food gift? Well, you’ll be happy to know I have tons of delicious giftable cookie recipes to share.

To start off, try out my Christmas Oreos (you can decorate them according to whatever season you’re in), then move on to some of my other favorites. These include red velvet crinkle cookies, the forever-classic thumbprint cookies, and my super easy cut-out sugar cookies.