Make Ahead
Sugar & Spice & Happy Valentine's Day Cookies
- Makes 3-4 dozen heart cookies
Author Notes
I make a batch of these every year for Valentine's Day to share with my friends, family, and co-workers. My husband gets a special plate decorated with red hots (because they're his favorite), which tastes delicious if you feel like adding them to your cookies. My favorite part about these cookies is that they travel really well if you want to transport them to work or mail them to far-away loved ones :). No crumbling, no breaking! —d_ribbens
What You'll Need
Ingredients
-
1/2 cup
softened butter
-
1/2 cup
vegetable shortening
-
1 1/2 cups
granulated sugar
-
1/2 cup
dark molasses
-
2
eggs
-
4 cups
all-purpose flour
-
1/2 teaspoon
salt
-
2 1/4 teaspoons
baking soda
-
2 1/2 teaspoons
ground ginger
-
1 1/2 teaspoons
ground cloves
-
1 1/2 teaspoons
ground cinnamon
-
red and/or pink decorating sugar
-
heart-shaped cookie cutters of small/medium size
Directions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and shortening together until well-mixed, 1-2 minutes.
- Add the granulated sugar and beat until the mixture is fluffy.
- Beat in eggs, 1 at a time, and add molasses. Beat until smooth.
- In a separate large bowl, whisk flour, salt, baking soda, ginger, cloves, and cinnamon together. Gradually add to the wet mixture in the mixing bowl until dough is blended and smooth.
- Refrigerate dough ~30 minutes wrapped in plastic wrap.
- On a floured surface, roll out 1/4 of the dough to between 0.5-1.0 cm thick. Cut out heart shapes and decorate the top with red/pink sugar. If sugar is not sticking, you can brush the tops with a little water or milk to help stick. I have a really small heart-shaped cookie cutter so I just fill a small bowl with the sugar and plop the little hearts in there, swirling them around to coat the entire surface.
- Bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes or until cookies are just browning around the edges. These cookies will spread quite a bit, so leave plenty of room between cookies on the cookie sheet.
- Cool on a wire rack and enjoy!
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