Holiday Sugar Cookies

By Christy Rost

Ingredients:

1		cup unsalted butter
1 ½		cups sugar
2		eggs
2		teaspoons vanilla
3 ½		cups flour
1 ½		teaspoons baking powder
1 ½		teaspoons salt

Cream butter and sugar until mixture is fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla; beat until thoroughly combined. In a separate bowl, stir together flour, baking powder and salt. Add flour mixture to butter mixture in thirds, stirring with a large spoon, to form a soft dough. Cover bowl tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate several hours or overnight.

To bake, roll half of dough to ¼-inch thickness on a floured surface or pastry cloth. Cut with cookie cutters, dipping cutter in flour between each cookie. Place cookies on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 375 degrees for 6-7 minutes until edges are barely brown. Remove cookies from cookie sheet while warm; place on a wire rack to cool. Frost with glaze, if desired.

Glaze:

Whisk together 2 cups sifted confectioners sugar, 2-3 tablespoons milk and ¼ teaspoon vanilla until mixture is smooth. Tint with paste food coloring, if desired. Spread glaze on sugar cookies with a knife or offset spatula; sprinkle with decorator sugars. Set aside to dry, about 2 hours. Store cookies in an airtight container up to 2 weeks. Recipe makes approximately 5 dozen cookies.