Okay, finally typed up the recipe
Thank you so much for the comments guys
I make everything from scratch including the icing (not the M&Ms, obviously
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Cookie Recipe
You need:
6 cups flour
3 tsp. baking powder
2 cups butter
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla or almond extract
1 tsp. salt
This makes a ****load of dough, and chances are you'll have some left over. Depending on the shape and thickness of your cookies, if you make them all about 3 inches in diameter, this'll make about 5 dozen cookies. So yeah, a lot.
Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. A good sturdy fork works well for this.
Add eggs and vanilla. Mix well.
Mix dry ingredients in a seperate bowl and add a little at a time to the butter mixture. Mix until flour is completely incorporated and the dough comes together. The best way to do this is with your hands, just make sure they are clean!
Now this part kinda sucks, you have to cover your dough (I just wrap it in saran wrap) and put it in the fridge for at least an hour to chill. 2 hours is ideal, while 1 1/2 is doable.
Before your dough is done chilling it's not a bad idea to start preheating your oven to 350 degrees. You need to preheat your oven at least 30 minutes beforehand
let me repeat that
YOU NEED TO PREHEAT YOUR OVEN AT LEAST 30 MINUTES BEFOREHAND
It is imperative that your oven gets to the exact temperature or your cookies will be RUINED. They will get air bubbles because your oven wasn't hot enough.
Okay, so when your dough is done chilling, get out a rolling pin and a mat and get ready to roll the dough out. This dough is typically not really sticky but if for some reason you are having trouble with it sticking to the rolling pin or mat feel free to throw a tiny bit of flour on there.
Roll to desired thickness and cut into desired shapes. For me, I like to lightly sketch right on the dough and then cut around my design with a tiny knife, but if you have cookie cutters that's even easier.
Bake on an ungreased baking sheet at 350 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes or until just beginning to turn brown around the edges. They burn fast so keep an eye on them.
When they are done, take them out of the oven and CAREFULLY put them on a cooling rack with the aid of a spatula or something. Let them cool for at least 15 minutes before you attempt to decorate them. They should not be hot to the touch when you want to ice them, otherwise the icing will not set and you will have a runny cookie.
Okay, now for the fun part...
Icing Recipe
Making cookie icing from scratch is ridiculously easy and this icing is great because it dries relatively hard, but not too hard, so it's still easy to eat and tastes great, but you don't have to worry about stuff like the icing getting smudged, and you can stack the cookies if you need to.
So, you'll need:
1 lb confectioners sugar
4 tbsp. meringue powder (this can be tough to find... usually it's by the pie mix at the supermarket)
2 tsp. flavouring, whatever you desire. Vanilla or almond is the staple.
RGBY food colouring to colour the icing (unless you just want white)
Cocoa powder if you want brown icing
Some smaller bowls (disposable paper bowls work great)
Okay, so, like I said, this is super simple. Add all your dry ingredients and the flavouring in a bowl, and make sure you don't have lumps in the sugar. Now, start off by adding a cup of warm water, mix, add another cup of water, mix... repeat until your icing is a medium consistency. You don't want it to be too thick and you don't want it to be too thin. It should be spreadable and not runny. If it gets too runny, add more sugar. It's very easy to just estimate when it comes to this. Just make sure you get that medium consistency.
So now you have a bowl of white icing. Pretty boring eh? Here's where it gets fun. Take your smaller bowls and ration out some icing to each one with a ladle or something. Now bust out your food colouring and get creating some coloured icing! Just employ your 1st grade colour wheel knowledge and mix them to get what you want. If you need black, mix all the colours. If you need brown use some cocoa powder, but just a little bit.
Decorating
Decorating can be fun and it can be frustrating. The best method is through trial and error, but I will share some tips:
- Make a couple of plain round cookies to practice decorating on so you can get comfortable with it.
- If you need to add more than one layer of icing, be sure that your bottom layer is dry before you attempt to ice over it. IF IT'S STILL SHINY IT ISN'T DRY. You will ruin your cookie if you try to ice over already-wet icing.
- M&Ms, or sprinkles, make GREAT eyes, since eyes can be hard to draw on with a pastry bag or squeeze bottle.
- If you don't want to use a pastry bag or squeeze bottle to do the finer details, a toothpick can work as well. You can also get a cool effect by dragging a toothpick with another colour icing on it through already-wet icing. Might want to practice first.
- When you are done with your cookies, let the icing dry, and then CAREFULLY place them in a ziplock so the icing can set OVERNIGHT. That's right, the icing takes several hours to set completely. Leave them alone and don't touch them til the morning.
Well, I hope this helps if anyone wants to make sugar cookies this holiday.
Thanks again and thanks OnkelC for this great thread.
