Spritz Cookies

I used to make these every year a couple days before winter break for friends and they were always a hit but I haven't made these for quite some time now. It's actually been so long (okay, not really, maybe four years) that I had forgotten about some of the problems I had when I first started baking them. So long story short, the problems and I had a little reunion...


I meant for this to be a "holiday" post and was hoping to have all this blogging business done before Christmas but unfortunately, my schedule was more hectic than I had anticipated and I ended up having to bake close to 400 cookies. I swear, every time I have to bake for the holidays or something, I say to myself "NEVER AGAIN!" but lo and behold, I always find myself back where I was: in the kitchen, 4 am, with the mixer mixing and the oven ovening.


Anyway, hope you all had a great holiday and have a happy new year!

The Ingredients:

-1 cup butter, softened

-2 cups powdered sugar

-2 egg yolks

-2 tsp almond extract

-1/2 tsp vanilla extract
-2 3/4 cups flour
-1/4 tsp salt

The Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

2. Sift the flour and salt together, set aside.
3. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

Reminder: scrape between each ingredient addition! And don't forget to scrape up the stuff from the bottom of the bowl!

4. Beat in the yolks and extracts.

5. Stir in sifted ingredients, in increments, or else you'll be covered in flour.

6. Option #1: Roll dough into balls, dip the bottom of a clean glass in flour and flatten cookie.
Option #2: Using either a cookie press or a piping bag, pipe out cookies onto a baking sheet. 

7. Bake until golden brown on the bottom, about 10 minutes, but I strongly recommend checking on them a few minutes in because they might be barely colored one minute, and then burned the next. And if you find that your cookie bottoms are burning faster than the rest of it is cooking, you can try the tip I mentioned in this post. 
8. Consume and enjoy!

Tips: These cookies are really buttery so if you're using a cookie press, I would recommend lining your cookie sheets with aluminum foil (shiny side up) instead of a silicon mat or you might have a bit of trouble with getting the dough to stick to the mat and un-attaching from the press, like I did. You might even have to change the foil after a few batches. Also, if you find that your dough is a little too sticky (if you poke the dough, it shouldn't stick to your fingers at all) you can add a little more flour. I add in only a tsp at a time and test it before adding more so I don't dry out the cookie.

Ideas: You can top the cookies with sprinkles, such as nonpareils, before you bake them or even color the dough. You can even use this dough for thumb print cookies! I like to top each cookie with a little bit of raspberry preserves and bittersweet chocolate (mmm...)