Whenever you make these cookies for someone, be sure to bring along several copies of the recipe!  You will be asked for it, I promise! NOTE: I make icing with confectioners' sugar and milk. I make it fairly thin, as I 'paint' the icing on the cookies with a pastry brush. Thin enough to spread easily but not so thin that it just makes your cookies wet and runs off.

The Best Rolled Sugar Cookies

butter, softened

white sugar

eggs

vanilla extract

all-purpose flour

baking powder

salt

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the  flour, baking powder, and salt. Cover, and chill dough for at least one hour (or overnight).


Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.


Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven. Cool completely.


This recipe is excellent for its purpose of rolling and cutting cookies...i tried another sugar cookie recipe and hated it...it didnt roll and cut as well and the cookies were flat and crispy...

i always come back to this one...

this year i made ghosts for my son's halloween party/parade and a friend of my daughter's birthday is on halloween so i made him a cookie bouquet using this recipe....

these cookies make GREAT cookie bouquets...

I add an additional cup of sugar and tsp of vanilla and my family liked them a LOT better...it didnt seem to affect the way they cooked either so that was good...this is still the best sugar cookie recipe ever for cutting out shapes and making cookie bouquets!! 

NOTE: i live in south florida where the heat and humidity is high - i always add between 1/4 - 1/2 cup more flour to all my cookie recipes 

Another NOTE: ....the dough, as you're rolling this particular recipe out does tend to be sticky ....simply keep dusting it with powdered sugar and you can continue to work with it...while adding additional flavor...

Thanks!

This recipe is WONDERFUL. Make sure you: chill at least 1 hour to firm up the dough. Knead the dough before rolling out with pin.  Use SUGAR instead of flour when rolling.  There are many options with these cookies. They are great iced (and gorgeous using the sugar cookie icing on this site), yet they are still delicious when sprinkled with decorator coloured sugar ( available at your local "bulk barn" in LOTS of colours).  If you like a chewier cookie, roll thicker, crunchier, thinner etc.  Oh, and WATCH these CLOSELY, and remove from oven when edges just begin to brown. If you leave them in too long, get them off the cookie sheet FAST- they will cool faster.  Lastly, use parchment paper to line cookie sheets for easy removal.
Two thumbs up!!

I must add my voice to the hundreds before me.  These cookies are a miracle!  While I like to think I know my way around a kitchen, sugar cookies have always been disastrous for me.  Not any more!  The best advice I every received was from a review below-- I rolled them out on parchment paper then pulled away the scraps from around the cutout cookies.  It eliminated damaging the cookies while transferring them to a cookie sheet.  I used 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla as suggested.  I made them for a wedding reception using the bride and grooms initials, frosted them with white icing and sprinkled them with irridescent edible glitter.  They were beautiful and tasty.  Thank you, Jill.  I'm now thinking of reasons to bake sugar cookies...

WOW...these are great sugar cookies.  Exactly what I was looking for.  I made them for my son's preschool class using dinosaur cutouts and they turned out great.  What I liked best was that they were nice and thick and held their shape well. I was worried about them breaking due to the dinosaur shapes but they really didn't!  They are very "sturdy" cookies and I would highly recommend this recipe if you're using cookie cutters. I will say..I made the recipe as is for my first trial run and the taste was bland.  Fortunately I added little mini m&m's so that helped.  The second time I took other reviewer's suggestions and used 3 cups of sugar (instead of the recommended 2) and 2 tsps of vanilla (instead of 1) and this made a HUGE difference with the taste!!  Tasted like the kind you buy at the mall!! A couple other tips that others have also said: Refrigerate the dough for a couple hours before using...this helps a LOT if using cutouts; definitely use parchment paper, and watch them when they cook! They cook fast!  My dino cookies only needed about 5 minutes (with 5 cookies on a pan). Seriously, try these cookies with those changes and you'll love them!!!

I made these for my boyfriend on our anniversary. WOW! These were it. As an aspiring pastry chef, I am always in search of great recipes and ways to "doctor them" . I made 1/4 of the batch the first time and thought they were a tad bland. SO when I made the full recipe.... I added 1/2 zest of one lemon, and 1 c. confectioner's sugar, and 1 c. granulated, for sweetness (10x sugar has more sugar per cup)creamed it with the butter, and added 2 tsp. vanilla and I followed the rest of the ingredients and instructions ...and they were exactly what I was looking for... these are THE COOKIE BOUQUET COOKIES! The only thing is you only get 20 or so cookies if you want them 1/2" thick...so I would double the recipe.

Delicious!  I tried this method I learned from a different sugar cookie recipe.  You make little balls with the dough, then dip a glass into sugar and flatten cookie with the bottom of the sugared glass.  Keeps you from having to roll them.  I also refrigerate the rest of the dough and only make as many as we will eat in one sitting.  This way you have fresh baked cookies every time.

I have made this recipe too many times to count!  I don't know what went wrong with those that didn't like it.  My advice:  FOLLOW the suggestions of others.  I read through MANY reviews and this is what I got:  1.)  Add in 1 more cup of sugar and 1 more tsp. vanilla.   2.)  Let the dough chill overnight (saves you from frustrations)    3.) leave your bowl of dough in the fridge and just take out the portions you are working on.  4.)  Use parchment paper when cutting out shapes.  You will need confectioners sugar, or white sugar, or more flour when rolling out your dough.   5.)  My NEW suggestion is, after cutting my cookies out, and removing the excess dough, I leave the cut outs on the parchment paper and place the whole thing in the freezer for a few minutes.  When they are stiff enough to handle I place them in a air tight container and let them sit in the freezer overnight or at least a few hrs.  Since it only takes a few minutes to stiffen I rotate between 2-3 pieces of paper (gotta conserve!)  I cook them straight out of the freezer.  It makes handling them a breeze and they keep their shape significantly better when done this way.  Warning:  you will obviously need to plan things out when  making them.  I guarantee the results are worth it!!!!  As another viewer remarked: they come out as good (I think  BETTER) than the cookies in the mall!  I have had people trying to pay me to make them orders!!!   Good Luck.....Cook-on! 

This recipe is TERRIBLE.  If I could give it zero stars, I would.  First of all, I am an experienced cook, and always follow my instructions implicitly.  The dough is TOO STICKY to be rolled out.  It's a nightmare, actually.  The cookies puff up like tiny cakes (and yes, I used the all purpose flour) and don't brown.  They're not sweet enough and have the texture of cake.  But first and foremost, they don't roll out. I was making these for my nieces valentine's day party and now, it's ruined.  I can't cut them out, the dough is impossible sticky and not "roll out" consistency.  I have no idea how this recipe received such high ratings...I picked it on the basis of the feedback, but now, I find I was sadly mistakened.  Just a terrible, terrible cookie.

These ARE the best!  I didn't change the recipe at all, and I don't see the need to.  I didn't have any problems at all with the dough being sticky.  Matter of fact, I used only very little flour to roll them out.  It was the smoothest, most cooperative cookie dough I've ever worked with.  I only chilled mine for 1 hour and worked with a quarter of the dough at a time.  I keep the remaining dough in the refrigerator until I was ready to use it.  The cookies turned out soft and moist...WONDERFUL!!!!

See how to make a top-rated sugar cookie from scratch.

the best rolled sugar cookies

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Cook Time: 8 minutes

Total: 2 hours, 60 minutes

Servings: 5

Cost: $7.05 /serving

Author : J. Saunders

Ingredients

Instructions

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