This dough freezes perfectly. The original recipe makes a very large quantity, so roll out a few sheets of dough and freeze them flat between wax paper and plastic wrap for quick cut-out cookies later.
When you take the chilled dough out of the fridge you may need to let it sit for a few moments before it is soft enough to roll out. The high quotient of butter makes this a very firm dough.
That firmness makes these perfect cut-out cookies for children; if you roll the dough at least 1/4-inch thick children should have no problem cutting and picking up cookie dough shapes. The dough doesn't tear easily or get too soft like other more delicate cookie doughs.
They are firm yet tender, with a very buttery flavor. If you sandwich them with a soft filling like buttercream or Nutella the cookies soften even more.
Sugar Cookie Decorating Ideas
Ice with a sugar glaze then sandwich with Nutella between two cookies.
Glaze with warmed jelly then sandwich with another cut-out cookie on top.
Drizzle with melted chocolate.
Ice with royal icing and stick on candy dots for decoration.
Best Cut-Out Sugar Cookies
2 to 3 dozen cookies, depending on size
1 cup unsalted butter, softened at room temperature for 1 hour 2 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature 1 cup sugar 1 large egg 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract 1/2 teaspoon almond extract 1 teaspoon lemon zest 3 cups flour 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt
In the bowl of a stand mixer (or in a large bowl, using a hand mixer), cream the butter and cream cheese with the sugar. Beat for several minutes, or until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg, vanilla and almond extracts, and lemon zest.
Mix the flour, baking powder, and salt in a separate bowl then gradually add to the butter and sugar mixture until fully incorporated and a soft dough is formed.
At this point the dough can, and should be, chilled or frozen. If making cookies in the near future, divide the dough into 2 balls and roll each out to 1/4 to 1/8-inch thickness between large pieces of parchment paper. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour. Or freeze the dough balls, wrapped in plastic wrap and a freezer bag, for up to 1 month. To thaw, leave in the refrigerator overnight then proceed with the recipe.
To bake the cookies, preheat the oven to 350°F and prepare baking sheets by lining them with parchment or a Silpat. Cut cookies out of the rolled dough and place on the prepared baking sheets.
Bake cookies for 8 to 12 minutes, depending on thickness. Let cool for 5 minutes on the cookie sheet, then remove to a wire rack.
Cool completely before icing or decorating, and store in a tightly covered container.
Best Cut-Out Sugar Cookies (Large Batch)
8 to 12 dozen, depending on size
3 cups unsalted butter, softened at room temperature for 1 hour 6 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature 3 cups granulated sugar 3 large eggs 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 1 teaspoon almond extract 2 teaspoons lemon zest 9 cups flour 4 1/2 teaspoons baking powder 1 1/2 teaspoon salt
In the bowl of a stand mixer (or in a large bowl, using a hand mixer), cream the butter and cream cheese with the sugar. Beat for several minutes, or until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg, vanilla and almond extracts, and lemon zest.
Mix the flour, baking powder, and salt in a separate bowl then gradually add to the butter and sugar mixture until fully incorporated and a soft dough is formed.
At this point the dough can, and should be, chilled or frozen. If making cookies in the near future, divide the dough into 2 balls and roll each out to 1/4 to 1/8-inch thickness between large pieces of parchment paper. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour. Or freeze the dough balls, wrapped in plastic wrap and a freezer bag, for up to 1 month. To thaw, leave in the refrigerator overnight then proceed with the recipe.
To bake the cookies, preheat the oven to 350°F and prepare baking sheets by lining them with parchment or a Silpat. Cut cookies out of the rolled dough and place on the prepared baking sheets.
Bake cookies for 8 to 12 minutes, depending on thickness. Let cool for 5 minutes on the cookie sheet, then remove to a wire rack.
Cool completely before icing or decorating, and store in a tightly covered container.
Royal Icing can be used on everything from sugar cookies to cakes and is a staple in the world of baking. Once dry, the look is flawless and will leave your friends and families amazed. Most think it's overly difficult, but in all reality it's quite simple, it just requires a little time.
Equipment Stand mixer (or hand mixer) Bowl Piping bags or squeeze bottles Plastic Wrap Mesh sifter
Instructions
1. Mix Meringue Powder We prefer to use meringue powder over egg whites any day of the week because of it's consistent results. Place meringue powder in the bowl of your mixer and add in water. Mix on low until combined with the paddle attachment — the mixture will turn slightly foamy or bubbly.
2. Sift Baby Sift! Although it's easy to skip sifting ingredients, this time it's extra important. You want the overall look to be creamy and smooth and sifting is what does that for you. Sift your powdered sugar (either first onto parchment paper, or sift straight in) and add to the bowl. Mix on low until mixture is combined. You might require a towel to hold over the bowl if your powdered sugar wants to keep jumping out.
3. Syrup & Extract (optional) For those that don't wish to use corn syrup, you're in luck, you can go without, the bad news is your results won't be as perfect and consistent every time. Add it to the bowl along with extract if you wish. Instead of butter you could also use an extract that might be more to your liking.
4. Faster! Faster! Increase the speed of your mixture to medium high or high (especially if using a hand mixer) and walk away. That's right, just walk away. Set a timer for 4 minutes. At the end of 4 minutes, watch the mixture finish up. Your goal is to achieve a peak that is stiff and doesn't fall over but is still glossy. Over beating is a no-no and will lose a bit of it's luster.
5. Time To Color Add colorings in very small amounts (think 1/8 teaspoon or less). Many colorings will effect the taste of the icing, especially depending on their age (which is why we usually add in an extract to help balance things out). Separate out 1-2 cups of mixture into a separate bowl and cover the original white (or main color) with plastic wrap. Color additional bowls as desired and cover until ready to use.
6. Pipe Borders Using a piping bag or squeeze bottle, pipe the borders and edges of your cookies. This will act as a dam for the remaining frosting that will essentially flood the cookie until set.
7. Dry Allow icing to dry completely, usually around 10-30 minutes depending on your air flow. If you have a ceiling fan or (clean) box fan, now is a good time to turn it on.
8. Re-Mixing Add water to the mixture you'd like to flood the cookie with 1/2 teaspoon at a time. This is not the time to try and hurry up, literally mix it in 1/2 teaspoon at a time, and mix well! Once it's ready, the mixture will pull away from the surface and rest on top of the rest of the mixture before sinking back in for 2 seconds. It should feel like syrup consistency wise. You can also do this step before piping the border if you are sure on the amount of icing you'll need.
9. Flooding Apply new mixture via piping bag or bottle to the surface of your cookie. You don't have to fill every last spot, a chop stick or toothpick (or end of skewer) can help you work it into the nooks and crannies. Add embellishments such as extra lines, dots or stripes.
10. Dry Again! Allow cookies to dry for several hours. This isn't a make and run out the door snack, we find it best if cookies are left overnight even so we're not tempted to move them before they're truly ready. The frosting can crack, dimple or get fingerprints in it if it isn't ready. Plan on this activity taking over your tabletops and countertops for the better part of the afternoon.
Skip the royal icing. Skip the pastry bags and the piping tips. Embrace your lazy inner baker. If you covet those glossy, perfectly iced sugar cookies but never felt like your pastry skills were quite on par with doing it yourself, I think I can help. This is the simplest, most straight-forward way to decorate cookies with icing that I know.
The Easiest, Simplest Method for Icing
I am here to tell you that it's entirely possible and perfectly legit to decorate cookies with a simple icing of powdered sugar and milk using squeeze bottles in place of piping bags. There are some advantages to using the traditional royal icing, which I'll talk about below, but for most of us home bakers — those of us who just want some pretty cookies to share with our friends and family — plain old sugar icing works just fine.
This is a two-step process. First you make a slightly thicker icing, a.k.a. "border icing," and use this to trace the outline around your cookie. Then you make a slightly looser icing, a.k.a. "flood icing," and fill in the area in the middle of the cookie. The "border icing" will work as a barrier to hold in the more liquidy "flood icing," creating a completely smooth layer of icing over the cookie.
You can color your border and flood icing with food coloring. I like plain white borders and vibrant centers, but you could color the border and the flood icing with the same color or use contrasting colors. You can also draw designs inside the cookies using either the border icing or by dropping a contrasting color of flood icing over the the cookie after you've finished flooding it.
I find that squeeze bottles work just as well as piping bags for decorating and are easier for us non-pro bakers to work with and they're easy to clean. My favorite are little 8-ounce squeeze bottles that you can find at Michael's and other craft stores. A small funnel makes it easy to fill them. The thicker border icing sometimes needs a little coaxing to get into the bottle — squeezing the bottle creates some suction that will help pull the icing into the bottle (check out the photos in the slide show).
Royal icing is what professional bakers typically use for this kind of cookie decorating. It's made with either whipped egg whites or whipped meringue powder along with powdered sugar and water and tends to be a little more stable and thicker than straight powder sugar icing.
Royal icing great for fine-detailed decorating work and Martha Stewart aspirants, but for the most part, I'm just not that fancy. I am totally happy with a cookie simply flooded with a layer of crunchy, sugary icing. I also like the fact that straight powder sugar icing can be made with a fork and bowl in just a few seconds and doesn't require any disclaimers about raw eggs when sharing the resulting cookies.
These cookies might not be quite what the pros would go for, but for friends and family, these fuss-free, homemade, hand-iced, sugary sugar cookies are a credit to the cookie tray.
If you are curious about royal icing, here are a few recipes and tutorials about working with it:
Thin, flat cut-out cookies like sugar cookies and gingerbread cookies are the best candidates for decorating with icing. These cookies are sturdy enough that they won't crumble as you work with them and have large flat areas that are just begging for a bit of decoration.
Make sure your cookie are completely cool before you start decorating or the icing will melt as you decorate. I usually find it easiest to make the cookies on one day and decorate them the next. Since the decorating itself is fairly time consuming, I also sometimes set up a cookie-decorating station on my counter and decorate a handful of cookies at a time over the course of a day or two.
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Iced cookies need at least 24 hours to dry, so clear a good amount of counterspace or tablespace where you can ice the cookies and leave them undisturbed. Cover the counter with parchment paper.
For the border icing:1 cup powdered sugar 1/2 teaspoon vanilla or other flavoring extract 2 to 2 1/2 tablespoons milk or water Food coloring, optional
For the flood icing:1 cup powdered sugar 1/2 teaspoon vanilla or other flavoring extract 2 1/2 – 3 tablespoons milk or water Food coloring, optional
EquipmentSmall mixing bowls Mixing utensils Squeeze bottles – 1 for the border icing and 1 for each color of flood icing Small funnel Parchment paper
Instructions
Clear some counterspace: Iced cookies need at least 24 hours to dry, so clear a good amount of counterspace or tablespace where you can ice the cookies and leave them undisturbed. Cover the counter with parchment paper.
Arrange cookies for icing: Allow fresh-baked cookies to cool completely, then arrange all your cookies over the parchment paper. You might find it helpful to leave a small workspace clear in front of you where you can move each cookie as you’re working on it.
Prepare the border icing: Mix together the powdered sugar, vanilla, and 2 tablespoons of milk or water for the border icing using a spoon or a fork. It should be quite thick, and if you drizzle a little from your spoon, the ribbon should hold for a few second before melting back into the icing. This border icing should be just thick enough to pour easily. If desired, add food coloring to this border icing now.
Transfer the border icing to a squeeze bottle: Insert the funnel in the mouth of one of the squeeze bottles. Spoon some of the border icing into the funnel and let it drip into the bottle. Since this icing is so thick, it can be difficult to get it to drop into the bottle — you can squeeze the bottle to suction the icing and start it flowing. If it still won’t start flowing, add more milk or water one teaspoon at a time until just barely thin enough to pour (be careful of adding too much or else the border icing will pool instead of maintaining a border). Once flowing, it can still take a few minutes for all the icing to funnel into the bottle. Prepare your flood icing while you wait.
Prepare flood icing: Mix together the powdered sugar, vanilla and 2 1/2 tablespoons of milk or water for the flood icing using a fork or a spoon. This icing should still be fairly thick, but it should drizzle easily and a bit of drizzled icing should sink immediately back into the icing. If desired add food coloring to the flood icing now.
Transfer the flood icing to a squeeze bottle: Clean your funnel and insert it into a clean squeeze bottle. Pour the border icing into the bottle; this icing should be thin enough to funnel easily into the bottle. If necessary, add milk or water 1 tablespoon at a time until a thin, pourable consistency is reached.
Prepare as many batches of flood icing as needed to decorate your cookies.
Draw the borders around the cookies with border icing: Begin with the border icing and trace the outline of each cookie with icing. Hold the bottle vertical with the tip of the bottle slightly above the cookie. Squeeze gently and with consistent pressure so the border is the same width all the way around. Think of this border icing like drawing lines with a pen. If desired, you can draw inside the cookie — thicker lines are better than thin lines for separating areas of flooded icing.
Allow border icing to dry slightly: The border icing doesn't need to be completely dry, but the next step (flooding the cookies with icing) works better if the borders are at least dry to the touch. If you draw the borders on all your cookies before moving onto flooding, the first cookies will be dry enough to start flooding once you finish drawing the borders.
Flood the interior of the cookie with flood icing: Using a bottle of the flood icing, begin filling the interior of the cookie with icing. Use the nose of the bottle to push the icing into the corners and against edges. Think of this flood icing like using a paintbrush.
Allow the cookies to dry: Leave the cookies undisturbed for at least 24 hours to fully dry. Depending on the thickness of your icing and the layers on the cookie, it may take longer. When the cookies are dry, the surface of the cookies will be completely smooth, dry, and resistant to nicks or smudges.
Store the dried cookies: Once dry, you can stack the cookies between sheets of parchment paper in an airtight container at room temperature for several weeks.
Recipe Notes
The icing will keep for several days in the squeeze bottles. It’s best to store unused icing in the fridge and let it warm to room temperature before using.
Since the icing keeps well, you can spread your cookie decorating over the course of a day or several days. I often create a station in my kitchen and ice a few cookies at a time over a day or two.
To make marbleized icing, flood the entire cookie with icing, then drop dots or draw a squiggle line over the top with a contrasting color. Run a toothpick through the contrast icing to "marbleize." For more details, check out this post: How to Create a Marbled Effect When Decorating Cookies.
Mint meringue cookies are an easy treat that you can put together in just a few minutes, with minimal effort. Most people buy meringue cookies in the store (Trader Joe’s always has a big display by the registers), but you can make them at home for a fraction of the cost with a few ingredients you probably have on hand.
I saw these Christmas tree meringues last week and I thought they were a fun spin on a traditional cookie. To make the trees, you just need to pipe a cone shape with a large, open star tip. I topped each tree with a Wilton star sprinkle, but you could top them with a chocolate star too, or anything else. You could also go the extra mile and pipe little royal icing Christmas lights on the tree – I think that’d be a cute touch!
Christmas Tree Meringues Ingredients:
4 egg whites, room temperature 1 cup sugar Pinch of cream of tartar 1/8 teaspoon of peppermint extract green gel food coloring star sprinkles royal icing
Preheat 200F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Place egg white, sugar and cream of tarter in the bowl of a stand mixer set over a saucepan of simmering water. Constantly whisk until sugar as fully dissolved. Remove from heat and whisk in peppermint extract.
Using the whisk attachment, beat the egg whites until they are a bright white, but still runny. Add in food coloring and continue to beat until stiff peaks have formed.
Place meringue in a piping bag fit with a large, open star tip. Pipe 1 inch cones at least one inch apart. Bake for 2 hours. After 2 hours, open the door slightly and let cookies cool in the oven.
Using a small amount of royal icing, attach sprinkles to the top of each tree. Store in an airtight container.
