With the holiday season right around the corner, it’s time to start preparing for the busy time ahead. Whether you and your loved ones are traveling or staying at home for the holidays, one seasonal staple can accompany you wherever you decide to go: your long-treasured holiday traditions.

One of the most loved and widespread holiday customs is leaving cookies out for Santa on Christmas Eve before bedtime. To make this tradition a little easier and more enjoyable for you and Santa this year, we’ve decided to talk to Santa about his favorite cookies. While he will gladly eat any cookie, he definitely has his top ten favorites.

Chocolate Chip cookies

You can never go wrong with these classic, delicious cookies. Santa himself lists these as his favorites, and he prefers them soft and gooey with lots of chocolate chips. If you decide to leave these out for him, make sure there’s a glass of cold milk nearby!

Sugar cookies

The beloved, melt-in-your-mouth flavor and texture of a good sugar cookie is irresistible, especially to Santa! These typically plain looking cookies make the perfect canvas if you’re the creative type, as they lend themselves well to decoration. Tap into your innovative side and use various cookie cutters and icing to make these cookies look like miniature stockings, snowflakes, candy canes, mittens, or christmas trees. If you’re feeling especially creative, try fashioning these cookies into the holiday season’s newest and biggest trend, ugly Christmas sweaters.

Read more: 8 Out-of-the-Box Christmas Cookie Ideas

Peanut Butter cookies

Simultaneously nutty and sweet, these cookies are notoriously soft and exceptionally delicious. Santa likes these cookies extra peanut buttery-y!

Gingerbread cookies

Another holiday classic, gingerbread cookies can come in many shapes and sizes. Perhaps most well known in the shape of gingerbread men, thanks to the nursery rhyme, the ginger gives these cookies an unmistakable spice. Santa loves when these cookies are decorated and shaped into a gingerbread family.

Pizzelles

Santa definitely has a soft spot for these anise-flavored Italian cookies. Pizzelles are traditional holiday cookies in Italy, and bear a striking resemblance to thin waffles.

Snickerdoodles

The enticing combination of cinnamon and sugar that tops Snickerdoodles is too good for anyone to resist, particularly Santa. These cookies are perfectly chewy in the center and crunchy on the edges, the union of which make for one tasty cookie.

White Chocolate Macadamia Nut cookies

Another classic, much-loved cookie, the perfect combination of crunchy, chewy, and sweet lands this cookie on Santa’s top ten list. The white chocolate macadamia nut cookie proves that white chocolate and macadamia nuts go together like peanut butter and jelly.

Oatmeal Raisin cookies

Sometimes, Santa craves a more nutritious cookie during his trip around the world on December 24th. While this cookie is by no means a health food, it’s certainly more nutritious than the rest of the cookies on this list. Santa loves to see this notably chewy cookie left out for him on Christmas Eve.

M&M cookies

M&M cookies are essentially a treat within a treat. The combination of the chewy cookie, the crunchy shell of the M&Ms, and the melted chocolate inside provide a variety of different textures, each equally delicious. The vibrant hues of the M&M’s add extra color to the cookies, which never fails to catch Santa’s eye.

Double chocolate chunk cookies

Last but definitely not least, these double chocolate cookies are always a rich treat for Santa. A favorite of chocolate lovers everywhere, these cookies are double the chocolate in the best way possible. If you’re feeling somewhat creative, try switching up the chocolate chips in the cookies and try the different flavor combinations that white, milk, and dark chocolate provide.