We hope you are liking the holiday/Christmas goodies that we are churning out for you. Kulkuls, rose cookies, chaklees and the other normal stuff that you make year after year is also planned to be on; but we thought it was better to put up something new for you guys to try out. Ta-dah, presenting Sugar Cookies – you can leave them plain or ice them- both are lovely. You can make stars, hearts, holly leaves, santa or any thing that you want, provided you have the cutters. I had lovely santa-cutters but just could not find where they were.
These cookies are firm enough to decorate but soft when you bite into them, and also keep well for quite some time.
Sugar Cookies :
1 cup butter
1 cup powdered sugar
1 egg beaten
1 teaspoon almond essence
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
½ teaspoon salt
2-1/2 cups sifted flour
Cream butter. Add powdered sugar. Blend in egg, almond essence, vanilla, salt and flour. Chill dough until firm. Roll to ¼” thickness on a well-floured surface. Cut with cookie cutters. Place on greased cookie sheets. Bake at 180 deg C for 8-10 minutes. Frost and decorate when cool.
Icing :
4 cups powdered sugar, sifted
2 tablespoons meringue powder
5 tablespoons of water
Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix on low speed until the sheen has disappeared and the icing has a matt appearance (about 7 minutes). Transfer to an airtight bowl. This is very stiff icing and a this point it is too stiff to use for decorating. Lay your cookies on a flat surface and take two three tablespoons of icing and add drops of water till it has reached piping consistency. Colour the icing or use white to pipe borders for the cookies. Pipe the edge of each cookie and let stand till set. Once all the cookies have been edged, transfer some icing to another bowl and add water so that the icing drips off easily when lifted. Use a piping bag to drop a big blob on each cookie and flood each cookie. Allow to spread…if needed prod it with a tooth-pick till it reaches the edges of the piped cookie. Break any bubbles that may form and allow to set.
You can add coloured candy or sugar or even paint them with edible food colours once they are dry.
I had made tiny rabbits, apples, pears, oranges and flowers but unfortunately my son thought they were ready to eat and when I took a short nap while they were cooling , my son gobbled them up even though they were not iced. So a small word of caution, keep them out of reach of your kids till they are iced or you wont have any left for icing J.
Enjoy !
These cookies are mouthwatering Judy!