After reading through many recipes claiming to be the "best sugar cookie EVER" on Pinterest I decided to try two of the most convincing ones out yesterday. More than likely it was an error on my part but I ended up with two batches of terrible cookies. I was pretty disappointed since both recipes took so much work, wasted lots of ingredients and I so badly wanted a Valentine themed treat.
Anyway, I had promised to bring a dessert to bible study last night so I knew I couldn't come empty handed. In a last desperate attempt I whipped up one more batch of cookies and although they weren't my best {Matt gives very honest reviews}, the icing sure did make them tasty and they were too pretty not to share!
We are currently studying Tim Keller's book "The Meaning of Marriage" in our couples bible study so I thought it would be clever to bring heart shaped cookies.
This was my first time experimenting with Royal Icing and I am definitely a fan, even though it requires a lot of time.
Best Sugar Cookie Recipe
From In Katrina's Kitchen
Ingredients:
1 Cup butter, softened
1 Cup granulated white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 egg
2 teaspoons baking powder
3 cups all purpose flour
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350° F. In the bowl of your mixer cream butter and
sugar until smooth. Beat in extracts and eggs. In a separate bowl
combine baking powder with flour and add a little at a time to the wet
ingredients. The dough will be very stiff. If it becomes too stiff for
your mixer turn out the dough onto a countertop surface. Wet your hands
and finish off kneading the dough by hand. DO NOT CHILL THE DOUGH.
Divide into workable batches, roll out onto a floured surface and cut.
You want these cookies to be on the thicker side (closer to 1/4 inch
rather than 1/8). Bake at 350 for 6-8 minutes. Let cool on the cookie
sheet until firm enough to transfer to a cooling rack.
Royal Icing
4 cups Domino Powdered Sugar
4 TBS Wilton's Meringue Powder
Wilton's Gel Food Coloring
4 TBS Water initially, plus additional while mixing
Spray bottle {optional}
Basically
use 1 cup of powdered sugar for every 1 TBS of meringue powder with
warm water mixed SLOWLY in until desired consistency.
If you're going to attempt Royal Icing, I highly recommend using Make Bake Celebrate's Royal Icing 101 Tutorial {found here}. It's the best one I found and she is very thorough with her instructions!
You can't go wrong with sprinkles so I loaded my cookies up before my icing dried. I was also pretty excited to break out my Heart Side-of-the-Cup cookie cutter from World Market that's been sitting in my kitchen drawer for almost a year. Love it? You can find it {here} for only $1.29!
Are you planning to make any festive Valentine treats this year? Oh, and if you have an amazing tried and true sugar cookie recipe, feel free to pass it on!
Happy Friday! Today I have a total hodge podge of things for ya...
- ONE - Soooo Matt put the crib together earlier this week! It is absolutely insane to see it assembled in our nursery now. It makes me so happy! And because we had so much joy from working on the nursery we plan to do so much more this weekend!!! I promise a post is coming next week. Like, pinky promise!
- TWO - I am a total snacker throughout the day. Sometimes just thinking about my next snack is what gets me through a meeting or a conference call. That sounds really sad but my appetite is insatiable these days. Not that you probably care, but here's a peek into my usual work snacks..
- THREE - I ran out of concealer earlier this week so I decided to pick up some e.l.f. Concealer during my weekly Target trip and I have to say, this $3 concealer is magical. I love it and definitely won't be splurging anymore for other concealer brands.
- FOUR - Although it's rare, Charlie gets so excited when I get home while there is still enough daylight to throw his ball in the backyard.
- FIVE - Now that I'm starting to slow down a bit, I've cut back on cooking during the week and save my fancier meals for the weekend. So about two nights a week I've been heating up Lean Cuisines for Matt and I. This is a very new concept for us since we've never, ever done microwave meals for dinner before but Matt has really enjoyed it because it cuts down on dinner prep/clean up and gives us more time together in the evenings. So we've been experimenting with new flavors and I've definitely found two that I really like but we are going to need more variety...so what are your favorite Lean Cuisine Meals?
Wanna join Darci, April, Natasha and I on the Friday fun? You can link-up on any of our four blogs every Friday! All you have to do is...
1.) Write your post about five things you're lovin' this week (or any five things you want to share!).
2.) Share the logo on your blog and link back.
3.) Link-up at the bottom of the post so some new readers can check out your five things and say hello!
How far along: 25 weeks!
Baby Size: An eggplant {9 inches, 1.7 pounds}!
Weight gain: Up 1.5 after lots of yummy babymoon meals, so 18.5 pounds total.
Maternity clothes: Oh yes.
Stretch marks: I think I see a very faint sign of these unfortunately. I'm still smearing all my creams on each night in hopes to avoid them but we'll see...
Sleep: I definitely missed my Bump Nest during our babymoon but am still sleeping great.
Gender: GIRL! And just because I can't resist I have to show off the cutest little onesies Laura surprised Caroline with...
Movement: Yes, especially about an hour after I eat and right when I lay down at night.
Best moment this week: Definitely our babymoon weekend in Charleston.
Looking forward to: More nursery progress this weekend.
Food cravings: French fries.
Anything making you queasy or sick: Nothing.
Labor Signs: Nope.
What I miss: I definitely miss being able to tie my shoes with no effort.
Symptoms: Growing belly!
Nursery: Our stenciled wall is complete and our crib is assembled! I promise to take lots of pictures and post soon!
Belly Button in or out? In, but it's starting to get more shallow.
Wedding rings on or off? On
Mood: A little anxious about all of the stuff left to do, but also happy and thankful!
Workouts: 2 elliptical workouts and 1 cardio funk class.
Prayer for Caroline:
Dear Lord, I pray for Caroline's little hands and fingerprints that are forming this week. Help her to use her hands for good and never harm and to be kind and gentle. Help her to use whatever talents You give her to be a blessing to others and to You.
"The Lord your God has blessed you in all the work of your hands" - Deuteronomy 2:7
