Kiaura's Christmas Visit

Since 2006 we have had a visitor at Christmas time. It is great fun. This year Kiaura will be six years old. We get to play with her and her mother gets some free time to do her shopping or catch her breath. I hope that Kiaura gets to take home some wonderful memories. Our activities are quite often the same. We play with the animated Santas; we make presents for her family; and we admire the Christmas tree. (see pictures)

Two years ago we began making Christmas cookies. It is quite an adventure making cut out cookies with a child. I make the dough ahead of time. She picks the cookie cutters she wants to use. Then she rolls out the dough and uses the cookie cutters. I move the cookies to the baking sheet and she puts sprinkles on them. After they are baked and cooled we put them in a tin for her to take home. She has learned how to dip the cookie cutter in the flour so it won't stick to the dough; How to wiggle it just a little so that the cookie is easy to pick up; How to avoid getting too close to the hot cookie sheet, but still see how pretty her cookies are when they come out of the oven. It is great fun.

I remember making cookies with my mother when I was young. Those cookies were tough as shoe leather, by the time we finished eating them. I looked in my recipe box and found that I have three cut-out cookie recipes. This is the one that I use. I don't know where it came from, but I do know that the dough can be reused time and again without making the cookies tough. This is important because Kiaura hasn't yet learned to put the cookie cutters close together, so we do a lot of rolling. Be sure to read all the way to the end for some tips.

Powdered Sugar Cut-Out Cookies
Ingredients:
1 ½ Cup powdered sugar

1 Cup butter or margarine
1 egg

2 teaspoons of lemon or orange flavoring
2 ½ Cups flour

1 Tablespoon baking soda

1 teaspoon cream of tarter

Measure dry ingredients, mix together and set aside.
Mix butter and sugar until fluffy.
Beat in egg and flavorings until well mixed.
Add dry ingredients and stir until it makes a soft dough.
Wrap in plastic wrap and chill 2 to 3 hours or longer.
Roll 3/16 inch thick between two well floured pieces of waxed paper. If you don't have waxed paper, you can use the kitchen table or any flat, hard surface, but be sure that it is very clean and dry before sprinkling it with flour. The dough will be quite soft and sticky so use lots of flour. Cut out and put cookies on baking sheet. Bake at 375 for 7 to 8 minutes. Cool on wire rack.

What isn't mentioned in this traditional style recipe is that you don't roll out the entire batch of cookies at once. It is generally assumed that the person baking cookies will have done it before. Experiment to figure out how much of the plastic wrapped dough will fit and not overflow off the waxed paper. Use slightly less than a tennis ball's size or smaller. I use a pancake turner to move the cookies to the cookie sheet. After the cut out cookies are put on the cookie sheet, gather up the scraps. and add it to the next bit of dough that you use. The cookies shouldn't be too close on the cookie sheet or they will become attached to each other. Because you use different sized cookie cutters, you cannot tell how many cookies you will get out of one recipe. If you don't have cookie cutters you can use glass cups of different sizes to give you round cookies that can be decorated as Christmas ornaments, or any way you want. Don't forget to dip the cookie cutter into flour before you cut out the cookie.

If you want iced cookies, mix powdered sugar and milk for a white glaze or add food coloring to get colored icing. Add just a little milk at a time until the mixture is spreadable. After the cookies are iced they need to sit for a while for the icing to set up. If you prefer to use sprinkles, put them on before you bake the cookies. If you don't have sprinkles they can be made by mixing food coloring into granulated sugar. Put it into an old salt shaker for ease of application.

The only other trick I have for handling dough is that I use an old cheese container, with a perforated lid to sprinkle flour on the waxed paper as we roll out the dough. We use my mother's rolling pin and some of the cookie cutters that I have, I used as a child. I can't wait until Kiaura comes. We had better get the tree up and the Santas down.