Easy Holiday Sugar Cookie Recipe

Food & Cooking Blog

One of the best thing about the Christmas season is making all of the delightful treats associated with the season. One of the most beloved is a traditional rolled sugar cookie recipe, such as from Tori Avey, that are then cut out into various shapes and decorated. Here is a foolproof, simple recipe.

Basic Sugar Cookie Recipe

This recipe will make approximately three to five  dozen cookies depending on dough thickness.

Ingredients:

• Six sticks of softened, unsalted butter. Do not substitute margarine.
• Two cups of white granulated sugar
• Four eggs
• One and one-half teaspoons of real vanilla extract
• Two teaspoons baking powder
• One and one-quarter teaspoons salt
• The zest of one lemon
• Five cups all-purpose flour

Instructions:

In a large mixing bowl, cream together the sticks of softened butter with the two cups of sugar. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs until foamy. Incorporate the vanilla extract. Stir the egg and vanilla mixture into the creamed butter and sugar. Once this is mixed well, add the baking powder, salt, and lemon zest. Begin adding one cup of flour at a time, using a wooden spoon to integrate the ingredients. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and place it in the refrigerator to chill for at least one hour, up to overnight.

Once the dough is chilled, remove from the refrigerator and divide into four sections. Leave one section out, and return the others to the refrigerator to stay chilled. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out the first dough section. Roll it to one-quarter of an inch for crisper cookies, three-eights to one-half inch for thicker, softer cookies. Once your dough is rolled, use assorted cookie cutters to cut the dough. Dollar stores are often a good place to look for inexpensive cookie cutters in the shapes of canes, ornaments, Santa, snowmen, snowflakes, and more holiday-themed designs. When you have finished getting as many cookies cut out of the dough as possible, place them on a cookie sheet and bake for 6-7 minutes. Remove with a spatula and allow to chill on a metal rack.

Add the dough scraps back to the bowl to chill, and grab your next quarter. When you have finished rolling out and cutting the other three quarters, gather the residual scraps and roll those out as well.

For the icing, mix powdered sugar with either milk or powdered milk mixed with water if you don't want to keep your cookies refrigerated until it is the desired consistency. Divide into batches and add food coloring as desired. Use the frosting as well as sugared crystals, colored jimmies, and other candies to decorate your cookies.

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28 December 2017