christmas sugar cookie - third time's a charm?

I will bake something over and over until I find the best recipe. My banana bread mishap is a great example (and yes babe, I will have to bake yet another batch until I get it fully right). This leads me to the continuing exploration for the best sugar cookie (see part 1 and part 2). I realized I needed a powdered-sugar sugar-cookie recipe, opposed to a granulated-sugar sugar-cookie recipe, to get that "melt-in-your-mouth" sugar cookie taste that almost everyone is familiar with. Enter: Betty Crocker. The website provides a sugar cookie recipe with 100% powdered sugar usage (opposed to a lot of other recipes with half-half on the types of sugar).


The dough was absolutely delicious (just the butter and powdered sugar mixture lol) and I couldn't stop eating it with my finger. P.S., notice the tiny dark bowl I'm using? I made this dough like a week prior (before I recieved my lovely presents from my boyfriend).


Once adding the flour mixture it became extremely hard to mix. I was so afraid I'd over mix so I removed my jewelry and dove my hand right in there. Both hands were eventually needed, and shortly after the dough somewhat formed into balls. Wrapped into plastic wrap and tucked into the back of my fridge until needed.



A week later, I was ready to test out my third sugar cookie try. I had just finished my last final for the semester and was ecstatic to celebrate with some roll-and-cut cookies! I found these little guys at the dollar section of Target. Is it possible that they’re too adorable?


The dough was pretty dry and these poor little babies ended up in the rubbish-pile.


So as stated before, my boyfriend (a.k.a. the most impatient human being on the planet) gave me my gifts early. I'd like to introduce you to Martha Stewart the Silpat mat.



Martha takes care of my little cute cookies and allows for easy removal. She really is a life saver.


The cooked babies! I even baked them 1-2 minutes less than Betty stated, but apparently they were still slightly hard.


I tried out my larger cookie cutters but I only had enough dough to make two of each cutter. (Okay- I admit I ate a good amount of the dough).

Now on to the decorating...

---RECIPE---
Taken from Betty Crocker!.

ingredients:
1+1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 cup butter or margarine, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 egg
2+1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar

directions:
1. Mix powdered sugar, butter, vanilla, almond extract and egg in large bowl. Stir in remaining ingredients. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours (or like 2 weeks in my case).
2. Heat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease cookie sheet (or use MARTHA!) .
3. Divide dough in half. Roll each half 1/4 inch thick on lightly floured surface. Cut into desired shapes with 2- to 2 1/2-inch cookie cutters. Place on cookie sheet. (I always refrigerate my cut out cookies for about 10 minutes to maintain shape).
4. Bake 7 to 8 minutes (I did like 5 minutes) or until edges are light brown. Remove from cookie sheet. Cool on wire rack.

amount:
Makes 5 dozen 2-inch cookies (holy crap, I must ate a ton of raw dough because I made nowhere near that amount)