The Best Sugar Cookies Recipes

THE BEST ROLLED SUGAR COOKIES

Steps:

• In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt. Cover, and chill dough for at least one hour (or overnight).
• Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.
• Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven. Cool completely.

THE BEST SUGAR COOKIES FOR DECORATING

Steps:

• For the dough: Whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Beat together the egg and vanilla in a small bowl.
• Beat the butter, granulated sugar and confectioners' sugar together in a large bowl with an electric mixer on low speed. Once incorporated, increase the speed to medium and beat until slightly creamy, about 3 minutes. Stop and scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed.
• Reduce the speed to low again and slowly pour in the egg mixture and beat until combined. Add the flour mixture, in 3 additions, increasing the speed as the dough gets thicker to keep the beaters spinning. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and the beaters as needed. Once all the flour is just incorporated, increase the speed to medium-high and beat until the dough is very smooth, about 5 minutes.
• Turn the dough out of the bowl and bring it together. Divide into 2 even pieces. Shape each piece into a flat square and wrap in plastic wrap. Refrigerate the dough for at least 3 hours or overnight.
• To roll, cut and bake the cookies: Position racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven and preheat to 350 degrees F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
• Dust another sheet of parchment paper with flour and put 1 piece of the dough on top. Dust with more flour and top with another sheet of parchment. Roll the dough out between the parchment sheets into a square about 1/4-inch thick (about 11-by-9 inches) and place in the freezer for 5 minutes. Repeat with the remaining piece of dough.
• From 1 piece of rolled dough, cut out cookies with a 2 1/2-inch cutter and arrange on the prepared baking sheets, about 2 inches apart. Refrigerate while you cut the remaining cookies. Reroll any scraps of dough and repeat the freezing, cutting and refrigerating process until all the dough is used.
• Bake, rotating the baking sheets front to back and bottom to top about halfway through, until golden brown around the edges, about 12 minutes. Let cool completely on the baking sheets set on a wire cooling rack, about 30 minutes.
• Meanwhile, make the royal icing: Combine the confectioners' sugar and meringue powder in a large bowl. Add 3 tablespoons water and the vanilla and beat with an electric mixer on medium-high speed until the icing forms thick and glossy peaks, about 2 minutes (adding up to 1 tablespoon more water, if needed). Tint with a few drops of food coloring as desired.
• Fit a pastry bag with a small round tip and fill it with the icing.
• Pipe royal icing on cookies with the design of your liking and let dry for 30 minutes.

SUGAR COOKIES

Steps:

• Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. Place butter and sugar in large bowl of electric stand mixer and beat until light in color. Add egg and milk and beat to combine. Put mixer on low speed, gradually add flour, and beat until mixture pulls away from the side of the bowl. Divide the dough in half, wrap in waxed paper, and refrigerate for 2 hours.
• Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
• Sprinkle surface where you will roll out dough with powdered sugar. Remove 1 wrapped pack of dough from refrigerator at a time, sprinkle rolling pin with powdered sugar, and roll out dough to 1/4-inch thick. Move the dough around and check underneath frequently to make sure it is not sticking. If dough has warmed during rolling, place cold cookie sheet on top for 10 minutes to chill. Cut into desired shape, place at least 1-inch apart on greased baking sheet, parchment, or silicone baking mat, and bake for 7 to 9 minutes or until cookies are just beginning to turn brown around the edges, rotating cookie sheet halfway through baking time. Let sit on baking sheet for 2 minutes after removal from oven and then move to complete cooling on wire rack. Serve as is or ice as desired. Store in airtight container for up to 1 week.

BEST-EVER SUGAR COOKIES

Steps:

• In a large bowl, cream the butter, cream cheese and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in egg yolk and extracts. Combine the flour, salt, baking soda and nutmeg; gradually add to creamed mixture. Cover and refrigerate for 3 hours or until easy to handle., On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough to 1/8-in. thickness. Cut with floured 2-1/2-in. cookie cutters. , Place 1-in. apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake at 375° until edges begin to brown, 8-10 minutes. Cool for 2 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks to cool completely., For icing, in a small bowl, combine the confectioners' sugar, water and meringue powder; beat on low speed just until combined. Beat on high until soft peaks form, 4 minutes. Cover icing with damp paper towels or plastic wrap between uses., Working quickly, spread or pipe icing over cookies; let dry at room temperature for several hours or until firm. Use small new paintbrushes or toothpicks and food coloring to make designs on the cookies. Let stand until set. Store in an airtight container.

HOW TO MAKE THE BEST SUGAR COOKIES RECIPE BY TASTY

Steps:

• Make the cookie dough: In a large bowl, cream together the butter, sugar, and cream cheese with an electric hand mixer on high speed for about 5 minutes, until fluffy and the sugar is mostly dissolved. Scrape down the bowl as needed to evenly beat the mixture.
• Add the egg, egg yolks, vanilla, and almond extract and mix well, scraping down the sides of the bowl.
• Add the salt, then sift the flour, baking powder, and cream of tartar into the bowl and fold to incorporate some of the flour. Then beat on low speed, just until incorporated and the dough comes together.
• Shape the dough into a flat disc and wrap tightly in plastic wrap. Chill in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours, or up to 3-4 days.
• When ready to bake the cookies, preheat the oven to 350˚F (180˚C). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
• Remove the dough from the fridge and let sit at room temperature for a few minutes to soften slightly.
• On a lightly floured surface, roll out the cookie dough with a rolling pin to ¼-inch (6mm) thick.
• Dip cookie cutters of your choice in some extra flour and cut out shapes from the dough. Gather any excess dough into a ball and chill in the fridge to firm, then re-roll and cut out more cookies. Place the cookies on the prepared baking sheet and chill for at least 20 minutes to ensure they hold their shapes.
• Bake the cookies for 10-12 minutes, or until the edges just barely start to turn golden brown. Cool completely on a wire rack before decorating with royal icing or frosting.
• To make the royal icing, sift the powdered sugar into a large bowl and add the salt. On one side of the bowl, add the vanilla and egg whites.
• Where you added the liquids, begin whisking the powdered sugar into the liquids, gathering a bit more as you whisk to prevent lumps from forming, until all of the powdered sugar is incorporated. Add food coloring, if desired, and whisk to incorporate. You can divide the icing into smaller bowls to make more than one color. At this point, the icing should be a good consistency for piping borders. If you'd like the frosting to be looser to flood or dip your cookies, add a few tablespoons of water, 1 tablespoon at a time, until it reaches your desired consistency.
• Decorate the cookies as desired.
• Enjoy!

WORLD'S BEST SUGAR COOKIES

Steps:

• Cream butter with 1 cup powdered sugar and 1 cup granulated sugar.
• Beat in eggs until smooth.
• Slowly stir in oil, vanilla, baking soda, cream of tartar, salt and flour.
• Chill for easy handling.
• Shape into walnut-size balls. Dip in sugar. Place on baking sheet and press down with the bottom of a glass.
• Bake at 350 degrees 10 to 12 minutes.
• Make about 4 dozen.

BASIC SUGAR COOKIES

Steps:

• Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl, and whisk to combine. Set aside.
• In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and granulated sugar on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes. Add egg and vanilla, and beat on medium speed until well combined, scraping the bowl as needed.
• Add flour mixture and beat on low speed just until combined. Scrape the bowl and fold a few times to make sure everything is well combined. Wrap dough in plastic wrap, flatten into a disk, and chill until firm, at least 1 hour.
• Heat oven to 350 degrees. Roll out dough 1/4-inch thick. Use 3-inch floured cutters to cut out cookies, and transfer to two parchment- or silicone mat-lined baking sheets, spacing the cookies about 1 1/2 inches apart. Reroll scraps as needed, chilling as needed until firm before rolling and cutting again. Freeze until very firm, about 10 minutes.
• Bake until golden brown at the edges, 12 to 14 minutes.
• Let cool a few minutes on the baking sheets, then transfer to wire racks to cool completely. Cookies will keep in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 2 weeks, or frozen up to 3 months.

SUGAR COOKIES

Steps:

• Whisk together flour and salt in a small bowl.
• Beat together butter and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes in a stand mixer or 6 minutes with a handheld. Beat in egg and vanilla. Reduce speed to low and add flour mixture, mixing until just combined.
• Form dough into 2 balls and flatten each into a 6-inch disk. Chill disks, wrapped in plastic wrap, until firm, at least 1 hour.
• Put oven rack in middle position and preheat oven to 350°F.
• Roll out 1 disk of dough (keep remaining dough chilled) into an 8 1/2-inch round (1/4 inch thick) on a well-floured surface with a well-floured rolling pin. (If dough becomes too soft to roll out, rewrap in plastic and chill until firm.) Cut out as many cookies as possible from dough with cutters and transfer to 2 ungreased large baking sheets, arranging cookies about 1 inch apart.
• Bake cookies, 1 sheet at a time, until edges are golden, 10 to 12 minutes, then transfer to racks to cool completely.
• Meanwhile, gather scraps and chill until dough is firm enough to reroll, 10 to 15 minutes. Make more cookies with remaining dough and scraps (reroll scraps only once) and bake on cooled baking sheets.
• If using icing and coloring it, transfer 1/4 cup icing to a small bowl for each color and tint with food coloring. Spoon each color icing into a sealable bag, pressing out excess air, and snip a 1/8-inch opening in 1 bottom corner of bag. Twisting bag firmly just above icing, decoratively pipe icing onto cookies. Let icing dry completely (about 1 hour) before storing cookies.

THE WORLD'S BEST SUGAR COOKIES

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 375°F.
• Beat oil and butter until blended.
• Add powdered sugar and 1 cup sugar; beat well.
• Beat in eggs and vanilla.
• Sift flour, soda, cream of tartar and salt together.
• Stir into sugar mixture.
• Mix well.
• Chill at least 2 hours.
• Roll into 1-inch balls; roll balls in sugar.
• Place cookies on ungreased cookie sheet and flatten with bottom of glass dipped in sugar.
• The cookies should be flattened to 2-inch rounds; don't flatten too thin.
• Bake for 10-14 minutes or until brown around the edges.