So, So Good and Not Too Sweet!

I was home all day today, plumbers here fixing the house water system, so I was bored and pulled out a few recipes to bake.  I had the windows open, Fall crisp air blowing in, and the aroma of my sugar cookies and peanut butter bars filled the house. The sugar cookies, what can I say, they are the best darn sugar cookies I have tasted, they are amazing!  They're so easy to make and decorate for any season with your favorite sprinkles, a little soft in the middle, a little crispy on the outside, not sugary sweet and just delicious.  Serve them up with a glass of cold milk, coffee, tea or your Pumpkin Latte that's now in season.

Recipe Below

To print recipe, click, highlight and print.

To view photos in larger format, click on them.

I use all kinds of different Sprinkles/Jimmies for my cookies.  This mixed sanding sugar I just found at a local market, so I decided to use it.

 All ready to bake them off!

 Right out of the oven and yea I ate it!

 Soft Sugar Cookies

Ingredients

5 1/2 cups of unbleached white flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar

1 cup softened butter (do not substitute)

3/4 cup canola/vegetable oil

1 1/4 cups of sugar

2 tablespoons water

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 eggs

Directions

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.  In a large bowl, sift flour, baking soda, salt and cream of tartar together, set aside. Cream together the butter, oil and sugar.  Add water and vanilla, and mix until combined.  Add the eggs one at a time. Gradually add the flour and mix until all is incorporated.

Break off golf ball size pieces of dough and roll between your hands in to shape of a ball.  Place on baking sheets about 2 inches apart.  Pour about 1/4 cup of sugar in a bowl.  Use the bottom of a glass dipped into the bowl of sugar, to flatten each cookie on the baking sheets. Sprinkle with a little white sugar, then decorate with sprinkles/jimmies.

Bake for 10 - 12 minutes.  DO NOT let cookies get brown on the bottom, just slightly brown around the edges is fine.  Remove from baking sheet onto a paper towel lined cooling rack. ENJOY!

Annual Christmas Cookie Baking Party Coming To You Soon!

My annual Christmas Cookie Baking Party is approaching fast.  My sister, my niece and I, did a trial run of baking and decorating some sugar cookies for the party to see how they would turn out.  Well let me tell you, my niece is a pro, her decorating skills are top notch, she did a beautiful job!  More pictues to come next week after all the "Baking Babes", as I have named my group of bakers, works diligently baking thousands of cookies to take home for the holidays and share with their families and friends.  Between my sister and I, we have purchased and collected over 150 cookie cutters to use, we will have a wide variety of shapes and sizes to decorate.  And speaking of decorating the cookies, we will also be using over 100 different kinds of sprinkles/jimmies, sugars, shimmers dusts and homemade frosting's.  I think we cornered the market this year with the cutters and sprinkles! 

Feast your eyes on these! Pretty AND they taste good.

Cookies, Cookies and More Cookies

My Christmas cookie party is coming up fast, so I started pulling out some of the cutters, sprinkles and jimmies, to see what I have and what I still need.  This is just a sample of some of the things we will use.  I found quite a bit of sprinkles/jimmies at Home Goods, they had some very unique colors and shapes.  One of the shapes I found, which I had never seen before, were gingerbread men sprinkles and candy canes, so I grabbed them.  IKEA had cookie cutters that are 3D, in the package are a big tree, a reindeer and a star.  I also found a reindeer face with antlers, he is really cute! And an angel turned to the side.  I found Food Writers, Wilton makes them, you can write on the frosting after it dries.  I have two cookie stamps, one says Merry Christmas, the other is a snowflake, and a Linzer cookie cutter.  We will be working hard that day so I like to prepare in advance and have everything lined up and ready to use.  I will also bake some things ahead of time.  The sweat shop will soon be open for business, there is a big list of cookies to bake, share and enjoy!

Another set of 3D cookie cutters and stamps.  Cookie cutter on one side then turn it over and stamp your cookie with the other side.  Pretty cool, found them at Sur la Table.  Santa, Snowflake, Christmas Tree and Snow Globe.  Each side has a different stamp so there are 8.