Christmas Sugar Cookies with Royal Icing Recipe

As Christmas is fast approaching here are the basic sugar cookies (recipe follows) that I made few days back for my younger one’s class Christmas party also I have provided detail description on how I decorated them with royal icing. Do check the detail post…

Yields :- 24-30 Cookies Approx

Ingredients for Sugar Cookies


APF/Maida – 3 Cups (Reserve 1/4 Cup and if needed add at last)
Unsalted Butter, softened – 1 Cup (Two Sticks)
Confectioner’s Sugar – 1and1/2 Cup (Replace with 1and1/4 cup of powdered granulated sugar)
Egg – 1 Number
Vanilla or Almond Extract – 1-2tsp
Baking Powder – 2tsp
Salt – 1/2tsp

Adapted from here

Method

• Cream together softened butter and confectioner’s sugar (Pic 1).
• Crack the egg into a separate bowl, and add the flavoring.
• Add that to the butter sugar mixture and mix until the egg is thoroughly incorporated.
• In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt, then add little by little to the mixture (Pic 2).
• You can either use hand mixture or by hand to make the dough.
• When you touch it, it has a little give, but does not stick to my fingers (Pic 2).
• The original recipe says no need to refrigerate and you can make it immediately but i chilled for 30 minutes(overnight works) for the dough to get firm and I strongly recommend to chill the dough for easy and perfect shaped cookies.
• Make the desired shapes by rolling the dough as shown in Pic 3
• Place the cut cookies in parchment placed cookie sheet.

• While working with dough take half quantity at a time and you can freeze the leftover dough to get firm for quick process.
• Bake at 400°F for 5-7 minutes and by this time the cookies usually will be super soft so don’t try to remove from the sheet, if you do so the cookies crack.
• Place the baked tray over cooling rack and leave it as it is for 5-8 minutes.
• Later remove the cookies and allow to cool completely (Pic 4).
• Store the cookies in air tight container and i used one day old cookies to decorate further.

Ingredients for Royal Icing (Approximately you can decorate 20 Cookies as shown in pictures)
Confectioner or Icing Sugar – 2 Cups
Egg White – 1 Large
Cream of Tartar – 1/4tsp (Optional)
Clear Vanilla Extract – 1/2tsp
Water – As Needed
Food Colors – I used Green and Orange


Method

• Beat egg whites with cream of tartar for a while 3 minutes approx or till egg whites start foaming.
• Then add vanilla extract and add sugar in batches.
• If needed you can add water, the stiff peak icing is what required to make borders (step wise Pic 5).
• Reserve half of the icing and color the remaining half icing with green color (Pic 6).
• Spoon the icing in to the piping bag (Pic 7).
• Now cut the edge of the piping bag with scissor and just pipe it over parchment paper and make sure the thickness and consistency of icing is good to continue.

• If the consistency is too thick add bit water vise verse add more sugar for the runny icing to make it thick.
• Pipe the icing over borders of the cookies and allow them to dry, it dries out quickly (Pic 8).
• Now make the same green color icing bit watery use spoon and fill the center of the cookies, using tooth pick fill the gaps (Pic 8).
• Allow them to dry completely before making further decoration to cookies.
• I again made a border with same color as shown in Pic 9.
• Now I used the reserved white icing to pipe zig zag strips inside cookies(Pic 10) and colored a small portion with orange food color(Pic 10) and decorated as shown in Pic 11.

Note:

1. I have reduced butter version and egg less sugar cookies recipe, do check it.
2. Also for icing you can skip egg and use 2-3tsp of corn syrup ie thick sugar syrup instead.
3. You can refer short video about royal icing here and a bit long video here.