Wedding Sugar Cookies

So yes, I may have fallen off the face of the earth... but I am back! I did a wedding last weekend, which took weeks of my time. Crazy, right! But I am glad I did it, just another wedding to put under my belt. (I am getting better at them :) So here are the wedding favors... Wedding cake sugar cookies. I frosted each one with different designs, did I mention I did 150 of these bad boys! So here they are, along with the recipe!


One of the designs... kinda looked like a strand of Christmas lights...but oh well!



Another design. I should have taken the pictures before I bagged them!



Piping the edges.



Fooding them with the royal icing.



All bundled up and ready to go!


Rolled Sugar Cookies-taken from Cookie Craft

3 cups all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
2 teaspoons vanilla* or 1 teaspoon vanilla plus zest of 1 lemon
food coloring (if cookie design calls for it)

*Instead of vanilla, you can use other extracts such as almond or peppermint.

1. Whisk together the flour and salt in a medium bowl.

2. Using your mixer, use the paddle attachment to cream together the butter and sugar until the mixture is light and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla (and lemon zest, if you're using it) or your extract of choice and mix until well blended.

3. With the mixer on low, gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture until the two are thoroughly blended.

4. If your cookie design calls for adding food coloring, do so now, and continue blending until desired color is reached and is evenly incorporated.

5. Turn out dough onto work surface and divide into two or three equal portions, Form each one into a rough disk. Click here for step by step and visuals of how to roll out dough and attain cookies of the same thickness.

6. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

7. After you have rolled and cut the dough and the cookie shapes are on parchment-lined cookie sheets, bake them in the middle rack of the oven for 12-16 minutes or until the cookies start to turn slightly golden around the edges.

8. Cool cookies completely on a rack before icing or decorating.

Yield
2 1/2-inch cookies--about 30
3 1/2-inch cookies--about 16
4 1/2-inch cookies--about 12


Antonia74’s Royal Icing Recipe
Ingredients:
6 oz (3/4 cup) of warm water
5 Tablespoons meringue powder
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 kilogram (2.25 lbs.) powdered icing sugar

Directions:
In mixer bowl, pour in the warm water and the meringue powder. Mix it with a whisk by hand until it is frothy and thickened…about 30 seconds. Add the cream of tartar and mix for 30 seconds more. Pour in all the icing sugar at once and place the bowl on the mixer. Using the paddle attachment on the LOWEST speed, mix slowly for a full 10 minutes. Icing will get thick and creamy. Cover the bowl with a dampened tea-towel to prevent crusting and drying. Tint with food colourings or thin the icing with small amounts of warm water to reach the desired consistency.