SNOWFLAKE SUGAR COOKIES!

   This comes from www.bakersroyale.com.  These look so good you don't even want to eat them. But, if we have to snack on them, what's the harm.  Go ahead and make a batch or two.


Snowflake Sugar Cookies – Dress up your holiday cookie tray with some fun and colorful snowflake sugar cookies.

Snowflake Sugar Cookie

I don’t make sugar cookies often, in fact I usually only make them for certain holidays and sometimes for birthday requests. I love the beauty and creativity of them, but they are massively labor intensive and I’m not the most patient person for baking projects like this.
But to save myself a step, I skipped flooding the cookies for the simple design you see in the picture. The royal icing I used is from here. It’s easy to work with and has the perfect consistency for simple lines like the one you see on these snowflake cookies.

The cookie recipe is one I have been working with and fine tuning over the years. Actually, the recipe started with me trying to re-create those soft pillow-y sugar cookies from the Ralphs grocery store. You know the ones that are super thick and covered in frosting. I don’t usually like grocery store made cookies but these are awesome, well minus the too-sweet frosting that I always scrape away. But I love the texture of the cookie portion, it’s soft and almost cake-like in texture. I still haven’t figured out how to replicate them, so if anyone has some suggestions or a recipe for it, please help a baker out and give me some tips.

A few notes:

• The dough will be wet and sticky once mixed, so it requires some chilling before working with it.
• Divide the dough and create four round flat discs for easy handling. Cover each disc in plastic wrap and refrigerate for up to three days or freeze up to 3 months.
• To keep the cookies nice and even in thickness, I use these rings on my rolling pin.
• Lastly, for the curious, using the cream cheese versus all butter gives the cookie a softer texture; and using powdered sugar versus all granulated sugar, also helps to keep the cookie soft and tender while giving it a tighter crumb and a less crisp texture.

Basic Sugar Cookie

Preparation: Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Line bake sheet with parchment paper.

• 3 cups of flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar, sifted
• 2 eggs, plus1 egg yolk
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla

Instructions:

1. In a bowl, whisk flour, baking powder and salt; set aside. Cream butter, cream cheese, sugar and powdered sugar until light and fluffy. In a separate bowl lightly mix eggs and vanilla together. With the mixer running on medium low, slowly add egg mixture to creamed butter mixture, continue mixing until combined. Turn off mixer, using a wooden spoon or a sturdy spatula gradually fold dry mixture into wet mixture and continue to fold until combined.

2. Divide the dough into four flat disc and refrigerate for at least 3 hours. Remove chilled dough one disc at a time and roll on a lightly floured surface into 1/4 inch thickness. Cut into desired shapes. Bake cookies for about 8-10 minutes.