Sugar Cookies

Two weekends ago I bought a container of 100 cookie cutters and I really wanted to use them to make cute sugar cookies that I could decorate. I talked to my friend, Kelsey, and asked her to help me, so the search for a great sugar cookie recipe began. I wanted to find a recipe where the dough would stay thick and not flatten out when they baked up. I found the base of this recipe on allrecipies.com but definitely made some changes. These cookies turned out awesome! Making these is time consuming, but really fun!

Rolled Sugar Cookies

banana, duckie, airplane, football, doggie bone, bikini, cowboy boot, football helmet

1 1/2 C butter, softened

2 1/2 C sugar 

4 eggs

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Zest of lemon

5 C all-purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

Pinch of ground cinnamon

Pinch of freshly ground nutmeg

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth (I mixed the whole recipe together by hand, but a mixer would be fine also). Beat in the eggs, vanilla and lemon zest. Stir in the last 5 ingredients. Cover dough and chill in the fridge for AT LEAST AN HOUR. (Believe me, you need it to be cold or it is really sticky!)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F and line cookie sheets with parchment paper. Roll out the dough on a floured surface to your desired thickness (1/4 to 1/2 inch thick). Cut dough into shapes with cookie cutters and place on cookie sheets. 

Bake for 5 to 7 minutes, but make sure you watch them closely. Some of the smaller cookies cooked up in less than 5 minutes! Cool completely before decorating.

I used store bought icing, food coloring and sprinkles to decorate these. Also, I forgot to take pictures of these, but we rolled some of the dough into balls and then rolled them in colored sugar; pretty cute. Lastly, we made faux snickerdoodle cookies by rolling some of the dough balls in a mix of:

1 part cinnamon

2 part brown sugar

2 part white sugar

YUM!

Here is my only other picture:

Gameday Sugar Cookies

I think they were a good luck charm because my Oklahoma State University COWBOYS and Chris' Kansas Jayhawks won on Saturday! (Shout out-Go Pokes!) At least I'd like to think it was because of me! hehe 

Give this recipe a try and don't be afraid to tweak it to your liking. I'm glad I did!