Food & Swine

Simple Cut-Out Sugar Cookies

Halle

This recipe is so simple and makes a great tasting cookie with plenty of structure to hold (and not disfigure due to puffing/spreading/etc.) whatever shape you cut it into.  The best part is there is no chilling time for the dough.  Yes, I’m being serious.  NO CHILLING TIME.  Mix them up, roll them out (on the thick side for a softer/sturdy result, thinner if you want them crisp), use desired cookie cutters and BAM, you’re set to bake. *I should note: There are two types of sugar cookies in my baking dictionary.  One is a soft tender fluffy cookie, not suitable for cutouts because that type of dough would spread significantly and not be attractive.  Tasty, just unattractive.  The other type of sugar cookie is a stiff dough, easily rolled out, cut and baked so the structure is maintained.  Not as tender, not as awesome…. in my book.

The more tender, flavorful (not suitable for cutout cookies) recipe for Grandma’s Double Citrus Sugar Cookies may be found here.

My daughter and I had quite a fun time baking together today.  She’s all about independence in the kitchen and she’s better at running my KitchenAid stand mixer than I am.  (she always locks the tilt head… good girl.)  We’re taking these cookies to her preschool tomorrow.  She wanted pigs so we could write “Hogs and Kisses” on her homemade Valentines.  The “Tiffany Blue” frosting threw me for a loop but she was noticeably upset when I suggested pink.  Apparently the boys in her class would  not eat the cookies if they had pink frosting. Sweet.

Enjoy!  “Hogs and Kisses” from our family to yours.  We’re on baby-watch 2014 with Cinnamon’s first litter coming soon.  We’re hoping for the best, that she gets along well and we’ve got fun news to share soon.  She’s really irritated right now with Mike… he keeps trying to touch her belly and check to see if her milk is in and in her own pig-ka-rah-tay she’s telling him to stop it NOW.  That girl can kick!  Look out.

Simple Cut-Out Sugar Cookies

Step By Step Photographs, full recipe at the end of the post.

First off, gather up your ingredients.

001

Then add 2 sticks of room temperature butter to a mixing bowl. (You can use your stand mixer, or sturdy hand mixer.)

002

Beat butter until creamy.

004

Add 2 cups of granulated white sugar.

014

Lock your mixer head in place.  *Good girl.

007

Beat until smooth and somewhat fluffy.

008

Crack 1 egg.

019

Shell check!  (None… yay.)  My trick to check for shells is a glass container on my black granite or a dark container… shells are much easier to see that way.

020

Add it to the butter/sugar mixture.  Mix until combined.

022

Add extracts… 2 tsp vanilla.

030

And one tsp almond extract.
031

Measure 3 cups of all purpose flour into a separate bowl.

024

Add 2 tsp (scientifically measured) baking powder to the flour.

025

Toss around with your hands to incorporate the baking powder into the flour.

027

Add it to the wet mixture.

028

Mix until a stiff dough forms.  (You may have to hand knead, this stuff is stiff… it must be this way so we don’t have to waste time chilling the dough in the refrigerator.)

035

Play in flour-explosion. Happy Valentine’s Day!

032

Turn the dough out, divide into 3 balls and cover the 2 you aren’t tending to with a damp paper towel so no dry crust forms on the outside.

041

Lightly flour your workspace if necessary and roll dough out to at least 1/4″ thickness cut with desired cutter.  Place scraps in next dough ball to be rolled out.

038

Transfer cut out cookie dough to sheet pan lined with parchment or silicone liners. (Silicone lined pans make such better cookies!)  This nifty bench scraper/cake mover tool is awesome for cut out cookies and pie pastry.  Love it, costs less than $15 too.

040

MAN DOWN!  Be careful, I said.

050

Once transferred to baking sheet, bake in a preheated 350 F oven for 10 minutes or until set.  (just barely golden on the edges.

047

Remove, cool a couple of minutes on the sheet pan.

055

Told you, they’re sturdy! Transfer them to a cooling rack to cool completely before frosting/icing.

056

Frost as desired… I used a closed star tip with no certain pattern on these hearts…069

The pigs got a little rosette, in case some of them didn’t like frosting.

075

Boys like cookies too!

065

Nice guy!

061

Hogs and Kisses!

083

It is NOT a real day in the kitchen for me unless I’m baking in my nightgown.  Ha, you thought I was kidding.  Photo creds to my 5 year old.  And yes… that is a HUGE garbage can in the background, my #1 kitchen must have.  (We have a little pull out garbage bin too… it just doesn’t hold enough for me!)

Mommy

Here’s a brief rundown of the frosting. (See recipe below.)

059

Process all suggested ingredients until fluffy and smooth.

060

*The way I cut out these cookies I ended up with roughly 2 dozen.  The yield of the recipe will change with the thickness of your dough after being rolled out and with the size of your cookie cutter.

Easy Perfect Cut Out Sugar Cookies

Ingredients:

1 C butter, softened
1 C granulated white sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
1 egg
2 tsp baking powder
3 C all purpose flour

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In the bowl of your mixer with the paddle attachment or a hand mixer, beat butter for one minute until soft.  Add sugar, cream until well combined and smooth.

Beat in egg and extracts, only until combined.  In a separate bowl combine baking powder with flour, mix together with fingertips or whisk.  Add flour/baking powder mixture to the wet ingredients. Mix until dough comes together.  This dough is quite stiff.  Hand knead if your mixer cannot keep up.

Use dough immediately.  Not necessary to chill. Divide into 3 batches.  Roll out to ¼” thickness, cut with desired cutter.  Transfer carefully onto parchment or silicone lined baking sheets.

Bake at 350 for 10-11 minutes. Let cool on the cookie sheet until firm enough to transfer to a cooling rack.  Cool completely and frost as desired. *recipe follows.

*You do not need to chill this dough.  If you must, let it warm on the counter a bit before rolling out.

American Buttercream

4 C powdered sugar

1 C butter

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp almond extract

pinch of salt

Blue and green food coloring (7 drops blue, 2 drops green)

Combine all in mixing bowl.  Beat until well mixed and fluffy. Use immediately.

Previous Post Next Post

No Comments

Leave a Reply