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Buttery Classic Vanilla Spritz

Servings 120 120 cookies (approx.), depending upon the size of your cookie die

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 cups salted butter
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1/4 teaspoon almond extract optional
  • food coloring optional
  • 3 1/2 cups all purpose flour

For decorating:

  • assorted sprinkles
  • semi-sweet chips

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
  2. Beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds, until butter is softened.
  3. Add sugar and baking powder. Beat until combined, scraping bowl.
  4. Beat in egg, vanilla and almond extracts until combined. If you are tinting your dough, read notes below.
  5. Beat in as much flour as you can with the mixer, stirring the rest in with a spoon, if necessary.
  6. Force unchilled dough through a cookie press onto ungreased cookie sheet.
  7. Decorate with sprinkles or chocolate chips as desired.
  8. Bake for 6-10 minutes or until sides are firm but not brown.
  9. Allow cookies to cool on pan for 1-2 minutes, then transfer cookies to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Recipe Notes

*I normally make a double batch and dye one green. If I'm adding food color to an entire batch, I like to add it in with the egg and vanilla. For this recipe, I divided the dough in half and then added coloring after dough had been mixed.

*Update 12-24-17: It's important to measure your flour correctly to insure the proper consistency for pressing the cookies. I use the spoon and sweep method which requires fluffing the flour by stirring it and making sure it’s not compact. Then, it’s lightly spooned into the measuring cup and leveled by scraping the back of a knife, or other straight edge, across the top of the measuring cup. (This is assuming that your measuring cup takes the measurement at the top edge of your measuring cup.) This should yield a cup of flour that weighs approximately 4.25 ounces. Since this recipe uses 3 1/2 cups of flour, an over measurement of one cup gets multiplied 3 and half times yielding much more flour than is required in the recipe.

Recipe source Better Homes and Gardens The Merchant Baker Copyright © 2014