Best Sugar Cookies

Since I don't start my job for another 2 weeks, I decided I'd fill my spare time with baking. (I found that baking, for me, is a great anti-depressant. I discovered this while in the middle of my unemployment blues.)

So I decided to forget about my "no-Christmas-celebrations-until-after-Thanksgiving rule," and just made holiday sugar cookies anyway. The girlies helped me decorate them. Before you look at their handiwork, YOU MUST COPY THE RECIPE and store it in some place safe. Because I have to say that it is the absolute best sugar cookie recipe I have ever used. It's from Betty Crocker's Cookbook: Everything You Need To Know To Cook Today, (2000). The link is found here. What makes this recipe so wonderful is the cream of tartar. Cream of tartar is pretty much my new favorite ingredient! It's an acid salt that adds volume to beaten eggs; it also gives frostings a creamier texture. So basically, it makes these sugar cookies really soft and fluffy. You can find cream of tartar in the baking aisle at the grocery store -- with the spices.

(To learn how to make the frosting for the cookies, click here.)

Okay, here are Macy's cookies.


She wanted me to take a picture of her hands. Yes, they -- as well as her face -- were covered with sprinkles and frosting residue.


What a cutie.




These are Lily's cookies. Her basic decorating strategy was to use all available sprinkles and candy. Forget about clean and simple lines. She wanted color! Right in the center!



She was being goofy when I tried to take her picture. Silly Lily!!


I took some videos of them, too. Maybe if I ever figure out how to upload them onto blogger, you can see the girls in full cookie-decorating action . . .

Thing I'm thankful for: Brooms. Those girls got sprinkles ALL over the kitchen floor!