What Christmas means to me.

Cookies! On Sunday night we whipped up the most delicious sugar cookies. It was late when we started so we refrigerated the dough over night and spent yesterday baking them {we didn't worry about icing them though}. This recipe makes stacks - we actually split ours into three lots for our three apprentice bakers; they made a tray of cookies each. We will definitely be making them again over the coming weeks.


Ingredients

3 1/2 cups plain flour
good pinch salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
225g unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups caster sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract or 3 teaspoons vanilla essence

Icing

2 large egg whites
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
3 cups icing sugar, sifted

Method

1. In a separate bowl sift together the flour, salt, and baking powder. Set aside.

2. In the bowl of your mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (about 3 to 4 minutes). Add the eggs and vanilla and beat until combined. Add the flour mixture and beat until you have a smooth dough.

3. Divide the dough in half and wrap each half in plastic wrap. Refrigerate for about one hour or until firm enough to roll.

4. Preheat oven to 180. Line two baking sheets with baking paper.

5. Remove one half of the chilled dough from the refrigerator and, on a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to a thickness of 1 cm. (Keep turning the dough as you roll, making sure the dough does not stick to the counter.) Cut out desired shapes using a lightly floured cutter and transfer cookies to the prepared baking sheet.

6. Place the baking sheets with the unbaked cookies in the refrigerator for 10 to 15 minutes to chill the dough which prevents the cookies from spreading and
losing their shape while baking.

Note: If you are not going to ice the baked cookies, you may want to decorate with coloured sugar, silver cashews etc.

7.Bake cookies for about 10 minutes (depending on size) or until they are brown around the edges. Remove from oven and let cookies cool on baking sheet for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling. Ice, if desired, and allow to dry completely before storing between layers of baking paper.

Icing

1. Beat the egg whites with the lemon juice (will be a smooth, slightly volumous mass, but not to peaks). Add the sifted powdered sugar and beat on low speed until combined and smooth. The icing needs to be used immediately or transferred to an airtight container as it will harden when exposed to air. Cover with plastic wrap when not in use.

2. Ice and decorate cookies!





Yum! Callum gives them his nod of approval.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone