Sugar cookies are fun, but they’re tricky. It’s hard to make dough that is roll-able, cut-able, and holds shape during baking—but also tastes good. There are no short cuts: that pre-made dough in the refrigerator section? It’ll melt if you try cookie cutters on it. Through trial and error, I’ve come up with some tips on how to nail making sugar cookies with toddlers.
My hacks won’t give you Pintrest-perfect snacks. They will keep you from wanting to throw flour. If you want to know how to make yummy cookies that are fun to create and eat, read on. After all, at this age, sugar cookies are as much art project as they are food.
Finding the Right Recipe
You need a recipe for dough that won’t bloat and puff (or melt) in the oven.
I used one from allrecipes that had great reviews. Here’s a link to it, but I recommend it with some tweaks. The cookies turned out pretty well in the sense that I was able to successfully make shapes with cookie cutters, get them to the baking sheet, and bake them—while they kept their shape. The downside is that they tasted plain without some tweaks.
Tweak It
The recipe calls for five cups of flour, which almost certainly aids shape integrity, but they weren’t super tasty. Even my son thought they were bland. I saw advice saying to add an extra teaspoon of vanilla and an additional cup of sugar. If you don’t want to mess with the recipe, just add icing to the final product. Viola! I just used the pre-made kind in squeeze tubes, and all that sugary goodness (and red #5) made them taste delicious. The finals product was soft (a little cake-y) and sweet.
A Word on Butter
Not to brag or anything, but my chocolate chip cookies won a blue ribbon—with a gold star—at the 4-H Fair when I was eleven. So, yeah. I guess I know what I’m talking about when I say: good cookies rise and fall on proper butter consistency. The butter has to be the right temperature when you mix the dough. It obviously can’t be hard, but for heaven’s sake, don’t nuke it. Butter should be soft (fingerprint indented) but NOT MELTY. Just put it on the counter for a while.
And while your butter is getting to the perfect temp, go ahead and take your eggs out of the fridge, and let them rest on the counter next to the butter. No, they’re not going to go bad. No, not even in an hour. Cookies have better consistency when dairy is at room temperature.
A Word on Rolling
With this and most sugar cookie recipes, chill the dough in the fridge before you roll it. It will be heavy, hard, and stiff. I put down parchment paper, which I recommend. It (somewhat) contains the mess. Be sure to dust the paper and rolling pin with confectioners sugar, otherwise it will stick to everything. I rolled the dough fairly thick, like a good quarter-to-half inch. It made transferring the shapes a breeze.
A Tip on Baking
I hate crunchy, stiff sugar cookies, which is how the ones from my childhood always turned out. To ensure this doesn’t happen, you need to under-cook them. I kept mine in for only five minutes, even though the recipe said 6-8 minutes. Every oven cooks differently, but this helps. They weren’t doughy. They were soft and delicious.
Sprinkles, Glitter, and More
This is the heart of this project: decorating. Get lots of sprinkles, glitter, dots, and icing. Let your child’s creativity reign!