This is a recipe for thick, fluffy, buttery, easy cut out cookies.  Nothing says winter holiday fun like a pretty Christmas shape cookie.  These cookies are so tasty with a subtle hint of almond, leveling up the sugar cookie experience.

Scroll down the end for a quick jump to the easy cut out cookies recipe as well as a bonus easy royal icing recipe for piping and decorating the cookies to make them extra fun and special.

Making and handling the easy cut out cookie dough –

• never melt the butter, keep the butter cold if possible, room temperature is fine
• use chilled dough – refrigerate for a minimum of 2 hours before rolling out
• roll the cookie dough out between 2 sheets of parchment paper, slow and steady, saving the scrap pieces for the next round of rolling out

parchment paper-lined baking sheet to avoid sticking to the pan and for easy, no oily clean up

Parchment paper is your friend with this recipe!  There is no need for flouring your work surface and having dry cookies.  Plus clean-up is a snap!  Simply use a sheet of parchment paper on the bottom, place the dough ball on this first sheet, then lay the second sheet of parchment paper over the dough.  Gently press and roll out the dough to just under about an inch thickness. 

This rolling strategy offers no fuss and no mess!  

roll out cut out cookie dough between sheets of parchment paper and skip flouring work surface – use chilled dough and avoid any sticking

Allow the sugar shape cookies to cool completely before piping. For piping and icing the cookies, there are many royal icing recipes out there.  I like using 3 simple ingredients plus a little lemon juice and white food coloring.

Royal icing ingredients and amounts:

• 3 egg whites
• 4 cups sifted powdered sugar
• 1 teaspoon lemon juice (fresh or from concentrate)
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract (optional)
• white gel food dye

Beat the egg whites in a bowl with a hand blender or in a stand mixer for about a minute until they are foamy.  Sift the powdered sugar to avoid any clumps or lumps.  Gradually beat in the powdered sugar, scraping down the sides.  The white gel food coloring will brighten up the icing and also help make any colors you create to have an opaque finish.  Learning to decorate and pipe cookies take practice.  With a few cookie piping tips, your cookies will look beautiful in no time.

storage – freeze cookies for 2 hours on a baking sheet, then transfer to a wax paper-lined Tupperware with a lid for up to 2 weeks

Easy cut out cookies piping tips

• keep a bowl of extra icing covered with a damp cloth to prevent hardening/crusting
• adjust the consistency by adding either more egg whites or more powdered sugar 
  • slightly thicker, toothpaste type for piping – use a pastry bag and tip
  • slightly thinner for “flooding” or filling the centers of cookies
• don’t go for perfect, have fun with the process!

Remember that homemade cookies are special in and of themselves.  If you want a perfect-looking cookie you can go out and buy some.  Try to enjoy the process and remember, they taste just as good no matter what they look like!

Why watermelon in the winter?

If you are wondering about why we choose watermelon for winter shape cookies, be sure to tune in to Modern Persian Food podcast episode #63, Yalda, where we cover the Persian Winter Festival!  This year Yalda falls on December 21st.  A special symbolic spread or “sofreh” in Farsi is set including candles to bring in light and love, Persian Trail Mix | Ajeel, and fruit for health and prosperity.  Most of the fruits that are displayed and served are winter fruits such as pomegranates and persimmons.  The unique fruit that has become thematic with Yalda is watermelon.  We thought it would be fun to make cute watermelon cut-out shape sugar cookies since Yalda falls so close to Christmas.

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