Valentine's Day Cookies

Baking cookies is so much fun, especially the kind you get to decorate! I haven't ever had a good roll out cookie recipe, but I got my friend's family recipe a few months ago and it is awesome! With Valentine's Day right around the corner, I decided it was time to whip out the baking stuff and make some heart shaped cookies. I had a few friends over, and of course my kiddos jumped in on the action too!  

Here's the recipe:  

Names Family Holiday Roll Out Cookies

Cookie Dough

1/2 cup soft butter

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

2 tablespoons cream

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 1/2 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

Cream butter and sugar. Mix in vanilla, eggs and cream and beat until fluffy. In a separate bowl mix flour, salt and baking soda. Mix flour mixture into wet mixture. Refrigerate dough until firm (I usually put it in the fridge overnight). Roll out dough to 1/4-inch thickness. Cut into shapes. Turn oven to 375 degrees and bake 6 - 10 minutes until very lightly browned. Cool completely on a cooking rack. Then ice with frosting.

Frosting

6 tablespoons butter

4 3/4 cups (1 lb) powdered sugar

1/4 cup milk

1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

food coloring

Slightly soften butter. Mix in milk and vanilla. Add powdered sugar and beat until well mixed. Add food coloring.

Here's everything else you'll need:

Rolling Pin

Cookie Cutters

Parchment Paper (optional)

Frosting Bags and Tips 

Sprinkles

Roll out dough and cut into shapes. Make sure to use lots of flour on the counter or your dough will get stuck and you'll have to use as spatula to get the cookies off the counter. That's what happened to us! Oooops! I used parchment paper on my cookie sheets (which I've never done before) and it worked great. It really helped get the cookies of the sheets without breaking them. I should have conformed to the parchment paper movement years ago!

Here's our beautiful frosting colors. Very festive if you ask me.

And here's the finished product.

Something that's kind of fun to do with these cookies is to tie them up in individual bags and give them away as gifts. You can give them individually or put several into a fun dish or basket. They look so pretty and they taste great. Pretty much the perfect gift if you ask me!