Butter Cookies

My love for baking goes way back, in fact, I can’t even recall when I baked first! Initially I tried recipes of friends/ family or from TV shows.  But whenever I tried my hands on any sort of cookies or biscuits recipes, the result was never perfect and with time, I stopped trying biscuit recipes after many failed attempts.

A few months back, I saw butter cookies recipe on my favorite blog and when I went through it, the recipe looked quite simple. And since I truly trust the recipes of this blog (which belongs to my mentor of baking!), I instantly decided to try the butter cookies recipe. As expected, the result was perfect.

The best part about these cookies is that they can be served and decorated in a number of ways. If you want to keep it simple, you can leave them as it is or simply brush it with egg yolks and sprinkle chopped nuts of your choice or granulated sugar on top. Another option can be making sandwich cookies filled with chocolate ganache or your favorite jam; the possibilities are infinite!

For a more sophisticated look, these cookies can be coated with royal icing in a number of ways. Recently I tried my butter cookies with royal icing and the result was amazing.

Preparing and decorating with royal icing, however, is a lengthy process and requires detailed explanation, which I shall cover soon in some other blog post. For now, I am posting just the cookies recipe, which I have taken as it is from bake fresh. Enjoy!

Butter Cookies

Ingredients:

Flour 1 ½ cup

Castor Sugar 6 tbsp

Vanilla Essence ½ tsp

Butter 4 tbsp

Egg 1

Method:

• Beat butter (at room temperature) and sugar until well combined.
• Add in vanilla and beat until creamy.
• Add in egg and beat well.
• Add in sifted flour and mix with hands just enough to form a uniform ball.
• Rest for 10 minutes.
• Roll the dough to 1/4 inch thickness and cut with cookie cutter in desired shape; place on an ungreased tray.
• Bake in preheated oven at 190C (no.5) for 15-20 minutes until golden brown.
  
  

Tips:

• If the dough is too sticky to bind, add little more flour to make it bind well.
• If your oven bakes unevenly at different places, its advisable to rotate the tray once half the baking time has elapsed; this ensures that all the cookies will be baked evenly.
• To check if the cookies are done, lift with a spatula or knife while still in oven and if the base is golden brown, the cookies are ready.
• After taking out from the oven, rest for 10-15 minutes before lifting from the tray; the cookies are soft when hot and may break.
• Once completely cooled, store the cookies in an airtight jar or container.
  
  

  

  Butter Cookies with Royal Icing