If you want gingerbread for Christmas Eve but don’t want the chore of rolling out gingerbread men, these easy gingerbread cupcakes from Pillsbury will also delight.

The frosting is made from Biscoff Spread,* ground spice (spéculoos) cookies in a creamy base. In Europe, it’s called spéculoos spread.

The all-natural, nut-free spread is made of 57% ground spéculoos cookies (the national cookie of Belgium). And it is luscious.

Unless you have some relationship to Belgium, France or Holland—or fly Delta Airlines, where they are served as a snack—you may not have heard of spéculoos (SPECK-you-loose; in Dutch, it’s speculaas, pronounced SPECK-e-lahs) cookies. In the U.S. they have been sold as Dutch Windmill cookies.

You can find Biscoff Spread in the peanut butter section. Trader Joe’s carries a private label version called Cookie Butter.

Ingredients

 
For The Frosting

 
Preparation

1. PREHEAT oven to 350°F. Place a paper baking cup in each of 10 regular-size muffin cups.

2. BRING refrigerated cookie dough to room temperature (let stand on counter for about 10 minutes). Then break up in a large bowl. Add eggs and beat with electric mixer on medium speed until well combined and smooth. Spoon into baking cups.

3. BAKE 14 to 16 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center of cupcake comes out clean. Remove muffin cups from pan to cooling rack. Cool completely, about 15 minutes. Meanwhile…

4. MAKE the frosting. Beat the butter and cookie butter in a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed, until smooth. Beat in powdered sugar, whipping cream and salt until fluffy. Place in decorating bag fitted with large star tip. Pipe frosting on top of cooled cupcakes.

5. GARNISH with a gingersnap cookie.

 
*The name is a truncation of “biscuits for coffee.”