Christmas sugar cookies

Hi everybody! I will share with you my favorite sugar cookies recipe that I make every Christmas season. This recipe has two types of icing: the more traditional one with icing sugar, and my favorite one with white chocolate. In both I use M&Ms to decorate the cookies. Some of the cookie cutters I use are quite big (e.g. the tree shape is 12cm long — 4.72 inches) so the quantities in the recipe that follows will make approximately 32 cookies.

Christmas sugar cookies (photo by the author)

Ingredients (for the cookies)

• 4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup (250 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Option 1: Sugar icing ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup icing sugar
• 3 tablespoons milk
• 1 teaspoon lemon juice
• M&Ms for decoration

Option 2: White chocolate icing ingredients

• 200 grams white chocolate, melted
• M&Ms for decoration

Method

• In a large bowl whisk the flour, the baking powder and the salt and keep aside.
• Using a electric mixer, cream the sugar and butter until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, and the vanilla extract. Gradually add the flour mixture.
• Wrap the cookie dough in a plastic bag and freeze for 30 minutes.
• Preheat the oven to 165 C (325 Fahrenheit). Line a baking tray with cooking baking sheet.
• Remove the cookie dough from the freezer and let it stand for 5–10 minutes.
• Dust the dough with flour and roll out to 1/5 of an inch (approx. 0.50cm) with a wooden rolling pin. Use cookie cutter shapes to cut the dough. Transfer to the prepared baking sheets.
• Bake for 10 minutes. Let them stand for 5 minutes and then transfer to a wire rack to completely cool down.
• For the icing (option 1): Sift the confectioners’ sugar into a small bowl and whisk in the milk and lemon juice until smoothed and thickened. Divide into separate smaller bowls and add food coloring of your choice. Spread on the cookies and decorate with M&Ms.
• For the icing (option 2): Melt the white chocolate. Spread on the cookies and decorate with M&Ms.

Enjoy!