Monday 11 February 2013

Valentines sugar cookies...

You may say I'm a cliche. You may say, "Pooh! What a cheeseball!!" However, surely, if you can't be cliche, or cheesy, on valentine's day that when else can you? Therefore, I have thrown myself, whole heartedly into designing some of the cutest cookies I have ever made! So forgive me, but I loved it!!!  I bought a set of measuring cups this week and so you will notice I have used cup measures in the recipe list, rather than grams.  It seemed to work, however, I found that I feel more comfortable, and trusting, of grams rather than cup measures!

For the sugar cookie dough you will need:
230g of butter.
1 egg.
1 cup of icing sugar.
 2 1/2 cups of plain flour.
1/2 tespoon of salt.
 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract.






The method itself is incredibly easy.  You start off by creaming the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Then add your egg and vanilla essence and beat until incorporated. Slowly, mix in your flour until a soft dough forms.  It will be quite sticky, this is normal!! Then wrap in clingfilm and refrigerate for two hours! I'm told, you cannot skip the refrigeration step.  I'm not entirely certain of why you need to refrigerate for so long, however, I do as I'm told!!

 Afterwards, knead the dough and roll out to desired thickness.  I then used a heart cutter and shaped different designs.  These then went in the oven at 180C for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown. 








The royal icing for decoration was pretty simple to whip up.
Ingredients:
675g Icing sugar.
3 egg whites.
3 teaspoons lemon juice.
1 1/2 teaspoon of glucose syrup.

You start by whisking the egg whites until they are frothy. Fold in icing sugar spoon by spoon.  Add in the glucose and lemon juice and then whip the mixture to thick peaks. I then added food dye in three batches. 

The decoration is then up to your imagination!!



I have recently found a new love, a love that sees me glued to my mac screen and visiting youtube more than ever.  And that love is baking blogs.  I couldn't write a blog post about the cutest cookies I've ever made, without pointing you in the direction of a blog that makes the most cutest cookies I have ever seen:                               
http://thedecoratedcookie.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/logo.buttonsm.png
                                                http://www.thedecoratedcookie.com

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