Each year, my employer is nice enough to give their employees (in addition to their yearly two weeks of earned vacation) seven days off between Christmas and New Year’s. With all this time off I figured I’d match a big batch of Christmas themed cookies to give out to friends. I got inspiration from Sugarbelle’s brown sugar roll-out cookies! I loved how woodsy and rustic the cookies were– very reminiscent of a Northwest cabin getaway. I thought my Seattle friends would appreciate cookies like these. My batch wasn’t as perfect as her’s but I think I came close.
I used her brown sugar spice recipe with some modifications.
Ingredients
- 3/4 c. unsalted butter
- 1 1/2 c. dark brown sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 tbsp. whole milk
- 2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. baking soda
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 3 c. all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
Instructions
- Cream together butter and sugar. Add eggs, extract, and milk. Mix until it is all well incorporated. Add all the dry ingredients a cupful at a time until all of the dry mixture is incorporated. The dough should be soft but not sticky. If the dough is sticky to the touch, add small amounts of flour until it isn’t.
- Chill the dough for at least 30 minutes.
- Roll to 1/4 inch thickness and chill again before cutting into shapes. (I chilled the dough for an hour because I found this dough to be softer than my basic sugar cookie recipe. A softer dough made it difficult to cut out clean shapes.)
- Bake at 375 for 8-10 minutes until tops are not shiny. Remove from the oven before the first indication of the edges turning brown.
Makes about 2 1/2 dozen cookies.
A few weeks ago, I found an awesome find at Walgreen’s. For only $10 I bought this Betty Crocker 101 cookie cutter set. It’s perfect for anyone just starting out because it has cutters for almost any occasion. I was able to find a shape for each of the designs I wanted to make for this batch.
Sugarbelle didn’t explain how she made the pine cone but I think I figured it out on my own. Here’s one of my dry runs at the design I practiced on wax paper. (sorry for the blurry camera photo picture)
The batch of cookies came out really well. The only thing that gave me problems was making the dark red color. I didn’t quite get the color I was looking for and I could see the colors I mixed together separating while it dried. Maybe that was due to royal icing that was made too far in advanced (see what happens when you try to be proactive?). I think I’ll try to make the icing the day-of when I’m ready to decorate.
