Receta Festive Sugar Cookies
So, I recently decided that it was sugar-cookie making time. I am a big fan of sugar cookies, and Christmas generally provides a good excuse for making them. It’s the same recipe that I’ve used for approximately forever and a half for making sugar cookies, and I shall include it here:
- 1/2 cup butter/margarine
- 1/4 cup shortening
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1 egg
- 2 tsp. vanilla
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 1/4 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
Mix all, bake at 375 for 6-11 minutes.
I got all nutty and used almond flavoring instead of vanilla. I am actually currently out of vanilla, but haven’t gotten around to getting any lately due to the fact that I am a.) poor and b.) in possession of such flavorings as butternut, almond, and black walnut, plus a few others, making vanilla seem, well, a little vanilla in comparison to all of my other more exotic flavorings.
The frosting involved a cup of shortening, 2 tbsp milk, 1 tsp almond flavoring, and a metric ton of powdered sugar. Technically it called for 1/2 cup shortening and 1/2 cup margarine, but I was getting low on margarine, and not wanting to go to the grocery store more then was strictly necessary, decided to go all out and just use shortening. The frosting was…stiff. Very stiff. It caused the various objects I used to dispense it to spontaneously spurt all over my hands several times (both cookie gun and bag-o-frosting). So I caved, added more milk, and it flowed much better. I sometimes have a hard time with frosting, and I think it’s because I pay too much attention to a recipe and not enough attention to the actual consistency of said frosting. I end up forgetting all of the gazillion issues I’ve had in the past with frosting that just wasn’t gooey enough, and neglect to add enough milk until the frosting has squirted all over my hand/counter/face/cat a few times.
Anyhow, I made some stars, and being too lazy to roll out the dough a second time, I made some standard circles.
And let me tell you, there’s a reason the recipe says to cook for 6-11 minutes. It’s more like 6 minutes for uber-thin cookies that you roll out, and several minutes higher for big fat cookies. Silly me forgot this and many of the first batch (consisting of the thinly rolled stars) were a tad crispier then I would have liked. The second pan contained both stars and hand-formed cookies, and in the interest of having the stars not burn, the hand-formed cookies were a little less cooked then they probably should have been. This is all good with me, though, as slightly undercooked cookies have the bonus of being soft.
Anyhow, not too many cookies were burnt, and the burnt ones were for the most part covered with enough icing that one didn’t notice the burnt taste too much. And as much as I do like having different cookie shapes, it’s always a pain to actually make said shapes. A little while ago, I got rid of all of my cookie cutters except for the super-easy one, as what’s the point of having angels and turkeys and such when their arms and heads always break up every time you try to peel them off the rolling surface. As a result, I have star shapes, I have a heart shape, and I think I also have a pumpkin shape, and maaybe one or two more. And that’s it. Covers all of the major cookie-making holidays except Easter, and for Easter I can just shape some egg shapes with my freaking hands, dangit!
These ended up looking vaguely Easter-like anyhow, what with the pastel green and all, but they are delicious, and that’s all that really matters.
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