It seems each year our holiday cookie baking gets more hectic. Aside from all the new recipes to try, as Moms know, when ‘little hands’ want to help, it slows down the process considerably. Of course I wouldn’t want to have it any other way, but the cookie baking does involve more and more time.
Since I have to figure out some way to shave a few hours, or days, off my baking schedule, I decided to look at what part of cookie baking we really enjoy in our house. Even though it’s a pleasant way to spend the day, up to our elbows in flour, sugar, and dough, the actual preparation of the cookies doesn’t hold a youngster’s attention for very long.
So, if I have to cut back somewhere, perhaps part of the preparation time could be done ahead of time to leave more time for decorating. After all, for kids, the decorating is normally where most of the fun is. Perhaps for us too!
That’s where my freezer comes in. Many of the cookies we make during the holidays are perfect for freezing; either in dough form or baked. This year my plan is to stock the freezer with prepared sugar cookie dough, cut outs, and baked cookies. Now we’ll be able to plan time to pop the cookies in the oven, enjoy the aroma, then frost and decorate to our heart’s content.
Since the most festive of all cookies is the decorated cut outs, I thought I’d start with them. I’ll share my simple recipe with you here:
- 1 1/2 cups butter, softened
- 2 cups white sugar
- 4 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 5 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
In a large mixing bowl, add the butter and sugar, put mixer on medium-high and cream together until smooth.
Add the eggs one at a time, with beater on medium.
Add the vanilla, beat until blended.
In separate bowl, sift or mix together the flour, baking powder, and salt.
Start adding the flour mixture with beater running on slow, until a nice dough forms.
Cover the dough with plastic wrap and put in refrigerator for 1 to 2 hours, or overnight is fine too.
When ready to bake, preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Flour your surface and roll out dough with pastry roller to about 1/4 inch thick.
Dip edges of cookie cutters in flour then cut out cookies.
Put cut out cookies on ungreased cookie sheets about an inch apart.
Bake in preheated oven on middle rack for 6 to 9 minutes (depending on your oven); watch closely.
Remove and cool on a rack before icing.
To save time this year, we’ll be freezing these cookies in three different ways:
- a batch of dough, frozen whole, to thaw, roll out, cut out, and bake when needed
- a batch of cut outs, frozen unbaked, to thaw and bake when needed
- a batch of cut outs, baked, then frozen, and brought out to thaw then decorate
That may seem like a lot of preparation work, but it saves time and frustration when you and the kids just want to sit down and start decorating some cookies. That way when you’re ready, all you have to do is get out the food coloring and mix up a batch of Simple Sugar Cookie Icing or a more Traditional Royal Icing for Sugar Cookies, and have fun!
I hope this helps you save time and frustration with your own holiday cookie baking. I’m breathing a sigh of relief already just knowing I’ll have extra time now to relax with my family, and have a little fun!
Warm regards,
Susanne – The Hillbilly Housewife
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