Easier (But Still Beautiful) Sugar Cookies

Happy Valentine’s Day! Is there anything more iconic on Valentine’s Day than sugar cookies? I have a confession… I love eating sugar cookies, but I hate baking them! Rolling out all that sticky dough, cutting shapes, peeling them off the table only to have them get all deformed, frosting all of them… bleck! It is such a pain in the badonkadonk.

But I have finally found an easier way to make ’em. And they are pretty to boot! Yay for pretty!

First, the cookie recipe. The thing that’s great about these is that they are soft and delicious and you don’t have to roll them out! No rolling… yippee!

• 1 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 2 cups white sugar
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 4 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract (this brand is my favorite)
• 5 cups flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt

Cream butter and sugars until smooth. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder and salt. Cover and chill for at least 1 hour or overnight.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Roll dough into golf ball sized balls and place on ungreased baking sheet. Dip the bottom of a cup in granulated sugar and smash each dough ball into a flat circle. Bake 6-8 minutes until the tops are no longer shiny. Don’t overbake or your cookie will be dry and crusty instead of soft and chewy. Cool completely before frosting.

Second, the frosting recipe. I use a traditional buttercream because I like frosting that tastes good. And some of the frostings out there just don’t. Sacrifice flavor for style? Never!

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 3-4 cups powdered sugar
• pinch salt
• 2-3 tablespoons milk
• food coloring

Cream butter. Add salt and vanilla, then powdered sugar, 1/2 cup at a time until frosting is stiff. Thin with milk to desired consistency. For these cookies, you will want a pretty stiff icing, so don’t add too much milk.

This is what frosting looks like if it doesn’t have enough powdered sugar in it:

See how it doesn’t hold it’s shape and it looks kind of grainy? I piped a bunch of flowers before realizing that I was a dope and the frosting was wrong. So I scraped it off, added more powdered sugar, then started again.

Moving on. Here’s the right way to do the frosting…

 It’s super simple. Put a 1M star tip in your piping bag and fill it with frosting. Hold the bag vertically, start in the center of the cookie and swirl around to the outside.

Bam. Gorgeous rose sugar cookies. Not only is this method of frosting super pretty, but it’s actually faster than trying to use a knife to spread frosting on each cookie.

So if you’ve been avoiding making sugar cookies, now you can bake up a batch and win over your kids, your neighbors, your hubby, your co-workers… yeah. Everyone will love these cookies!

Wouldn’t they be gorgeous for a bridal shower or a baby shower or a tea party or a little girl’s birthday party? Just change the color of the frosting to match the party decor! I see many of these cookies in my future!