It has been a Halloween tradition of mine to make iced sugar cookies for 10+ years now. It started off as something I did with my high school friends and then became a tradition my college friends and I carried on. It has now become a fall ritual that we plan for every year. Everyone looks forward to a full day of rolling dough, icing cookies, and making a certain unmentionable "bonus cookie" with the end of the cookie dough remnants. This year was no exception.
It starts off with some simple sugar cookies. I have 20some Halloween cookie cutters.. Frankenstein, haunted houses, creepy cats, ghosts... the list goes on.
My Favorite Sugar Cookie Recipe-
1 cup sugar
3/4 cup butter or margarine (I use a combination of both)
1 egg
3 Tbs whipping cream (milk will work just fine)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
3 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
*Combine sugar, butter, egg, whipping cream, vanilla, and almond extract. Beat at a medium speed until light and fluffy. Add flour, baking powder and salt. Mix until a soft dough forms.
*Cover with plastic wrap and cool for 1-2 hours (this step in a must in working with rolled dough!)
*Heat oven to 400 degrees. Roll dough out on a floured surface until 1/4" thick and cut with your favorite cookie cutters. Transfer to a cookie sheet and bake for 5-7 minutes until the edges are golden brown.
For a change this year, we decided to make glossy icing rather than my favorite buttercream icing. While it's not quite as tasty as buttercream, the glossy icing makes for a really cute final product. The colors are brighter and the icing hardens a bit more for easier storage. Plus, you can actually pipe the glossy icing onto the cookies which is a little more fun than using a plain ole knife if you ask me!
3 cups powdered sugar
2 Tbs milk
3 Tbs light corn syrup
1 tsp almond extract
assorted food coloring
*Mix sugar and milk until smooth. Add in corn syrup and almond extract. You may need to add additional corn syrup until you get the perfect thin glossy consistency.
*Divide into small bowls, add food coloring, and pour into piping bags.
After a l-o-n-g day of icing cookies, promise yourself you will not make sugar cookies again until next Halloween. That is unless you are crazy, which I most definitely am. I'm planning to make these babies again with the buttercream icing this weekend with another group of dedicated Halloween cookie decorators. We may have to pull out the cats and ghosts for a little change though- I don't think I can decorate another leaf for a while :)
Beautiful, as always! I LOVE your sugar cookies, and my mouth is watering as I write this. Thanks for sharing the recipe, although, I think mine would not taste as good as yours!
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