Our Favorite Sugar Cookies

When my kids were young, we always made these cookies for Valentines Day, Halloween and Christmas. Last night, I decided to throw together a batch. I love these because the recipe makes about 40 large cookies, enough for eating and sharing. The cookies by themselves are not very sweet. Frosting on these cookies adds just the right amount of sweet.  Yum.
Happy Halloween!

Our Favorite Sugar Cookies
A Bountiful Kitchen
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1 cup butter
1 cup Crisco shortening
2 1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla
3 eggs

6 cups flour
4 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup milk

Cream the butter, shortening and sugar together.
Mix in vanilla and eggs. Beat until blended well.
In a separate bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, and salt.
Add flour mixture alternately with milk. Mix at low speed just until all flour and milk are mixed into the butter mixture. Do not over mix.
You may refrigerate at this point, over night or up to three days before baking.
Roll out on floured surface in batches about 1/4 inch thick. Cut with cookie cutters into desired shapes.
Place on ungreased baking sheets about one inch apart.
Bake at 350 degrees for about 12  minutes or until lightly golden on edges.
Yields about 40 3x5 inch cookies

Tips:
-The dough will spread and puff up. Do not place too close together. If the cookie dough is refrigerated, the dough will not spread as much.


Butter Cream Frosting

1 cup butter, room temperature
6 cups powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
about 1/4 cup milk

Beat butter until soft. Add 3 cups of powdered sugar. Continue mixing on low. Add salt and vanilla. Add 2 more cups of the powdered sugar. Mix until smooth. Add the milk a tablespoon at a time, along with the last cup of powdered sugar. Scrape down sides of bowl, and mix until all ingredients are incorporated and smooth. Add food coloring if desired.
Yields enough frosting for about four dozen cookies.

Tips:
- I like to color the frosting in batches, so the cookies are not all exactly the same color. To do this, mix in the food coloring at half strength. For instance; the directions to color a batch of frosting calls for 12 drops of yellow and 4 red. I used 6 yellow and 2 red, and frosted about 12 of the cookies. With the remaining frosting, I added in 3 more drops of yellow and 2 red. I frosted 15 of the cookies in this shade of orange. Then I added a few more drops and frosted the remaining cookies. If this is too complicated, just divide the frosting into bowls, and color each bowl a different shade. Or, color the whole bowl of frosting the same shade.
-Also, I'm not a huge fan of using a lot of food coloring, so my frosting is a pale shade. If you like your frosting to be darker in color, you'll have to double the amount of coloring.

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