Things Neniell Made: Buttercookies: Butterflies

Butter cookies are one of my favorite types of cookies to make. The main downside to making butter cookies is that it can be very time consuming; it all depends on how much you want to decorate them. I typically decorate butter cookies with frosting, sometimes adding sugar as well. I prefer using a butter cookie recipe when decorating cookies with frosting because you aren't overwhelmed with sweetness when you eat the cookies.

I always use the butter cookie recipe that I got from my grandma many years ago. It is easy, has few ingredients, and doesn't have too strong of a flavor.

Butter Cookie Recipe (Printer-friendly PDF Version)

1 cup butter

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp vanilla

3 egg yolks

2 1/2 cups flour

Beat the butter and sugar together until creamy. Add the egg yolks and vanilla and mix until combined. Add half of the flour and mix until combined. Add the rest of the flour and mix until it is as combined as the mixer will allow. At this point you will most likely have to finish mixing in the flour by hand. The easiest way to do this by folding the dough into itself until there are no crumbly bits left. You don't want to over mix cookie dough, always mix until just combined unless the directions say otherwise.

Cover and chill the cookie dough for at least a half hour. I typically chill the cookie dough over night. The downside to doing this is that the dough gets very hard. You will either have to let the dough sit out for a half hour until soft enough to work with or carefully warm it in the microwave. If you use a microwave, warm the dough for 6 seconds at a time on a very low power level (I usually use power level 2).

Roll out the cookie dough on a well floured surface to 1/4 inch thickness. Cut shapes into the dough with desired cookie cutters. I used butterflies this time! Peeling away the excess cookie dough makes it easier to lift up the shapes without distorting them. Place cutouts on a baking sheet at least a half inch apart. They generally don't spread too much when baked; the spacing makes it easier to remove the baked cookies from the sheet.

Bake the cookies at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Cool the cookies completely before decorating with frosting! These cookies can be very fragile, so be careful when handling them or you will have broken cookies.

For frosting, I tend to use the recipe that I learned while taking the Wilton Cake Decorating classes. I cut the recipe in half except for the amount of meringue powder.

Wilton Frosting
1 cup shortening
6 T water
1 tsp clear vanilla
1 T meringue powder
1 box powder sugar (approximately 4 cups)

Combine shortening, water, and vanilla. Mix well. Add meringue powder and powder sugar. Mix on low speed for 2 minutes for frosting with minimum air bubbles. For fluffy frosting, beat on medium speed for 4 minutes.

I made the frosting while the last sheet of cookies were in the oven. This gives the cookies enough time to cook if you start with the first sheet that came out (if not, place the cookie sheet in the freezer for a few minutes). Since I used colored sugars in the decorating process, I didn't color the frosting. Any design can be made on the cookies, so be as creative as you like.

To apply frosting to the cookies, I used a parchment bag with a size 3 tip.

It is easiest to start decorating the butterflies by frosting the body first. Once the body area is covered, place the cookie top down into the colored sugars. To add each color, pipe the frosting onto the cookie in the desired design and place the cookie top down into the sugars. It is best to use the darker colored sugars before the lighter colors. Otherwise, the light sugared areas will have dark colored crystals in them.