Sugar Cookies

Wanna hear a gross story? If not, just skip to the recipe, below.

In addition to the cake that I made, I wanted to make and ice cookies for the first time. Sure, I've made cookies before and I've iced things. But I've never iced cookies.

This was my first foray into royal icing.

I'll spare you the preparation pictures. Actually, there aren't any since I was covered in royal icing. By this point, I had made the cake, made the muffins, made, rolled, cut and baked the cookies. I had also made the pudding. So, I was tired. I probably should have made some components earlier in the week.

I think I included too much water in the royal icing and it went all over the place. My hand, the counter, etc. I ended up throwing out the first paper piping bag. After making a second and filling it, it was still dripping from both ends. Next, I thought I would just grab onto the bag, between my teeth. It sort of worked until the bag got stuck to my lip. Then, I pulled the bag off and...let's just say that I'm glad that we have the capacity to heal ourselves. Ouch.

I iced about 40 cookies. But, cut down my ultimate goal (multiple sizes, multiple colours, more decorations).

Funnily enough, they were still a hit.

A big THANK YOU goes to Katie from Good Things Catered. If you scroll through her blog, you'll see how talented and creative she is. Katie was really generous in setting me on the right track. I used her recipe for sugar cookies, which originates from her friend, Ashley.

Fabulous Sugar Cookies

Ingredients:
1 1/2 c. butter
1 1/2 c. granulated sugar
1/2 c. powdered sugar
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp almond extract
1 Tbsp lemon zest
5 c. flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
Powdered sugar, for rolling

Directions:
-Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
-Cream butter and sugars in a mixer for 5 minutes.
-Add eggs one at a time, mixing thoroughly.
-Add vanilla, almond, and lemon zest.
-Sift in flour, baking powder, and salt a little at a time.
-Do not over mix, this process should take about one minute.

-Chill dough for up to a week in the fridge, or roll out and cut right away.
-Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and bake cookies for 7-8 minutes (even if it doesn't look done, take it out)
-Wait until cookies are cooled before icing. I also got the tip to at least move the cookies on the sheet a little bit so that they won't stick when they cool. I opten to just put them on a cooling rack.

The number of cookies this recipe makes depends on the thickness. Katie got about 30-32 big, thick cookies. I got about 60 cookies (they're circular cookies 2-3 inches in diameter).

To ice the cookies, I used Wilton's Royal Icing recipe. I added a bit of blue food colouring and iced my cookies.



I truly had big decorating plans...but it was getting late and I was exhausted. Thankfully, I still have more than 1/2 of both the cookies and icing left, for future cookie-making endeavours.

Despite everything, the cookies were a hit at the party. All of them were either eaten or taken home by others at the party.


They were so much of a hit, that even someone who shouldn't have eaten a cookie stole one...He was quickly incarcerated.


Even though these are technically baby shower cookies, I think they could also double as Christmas cookies. So, I am submitting these cookies to Food Blogga's Eat Christmas Cookies Event. The roundup is provided as submissions come in (until Dec. 21st), so go check out the cookies here.