Who doesn’t love sugar cookies?! These are just like the seasonal cutout cookies you can buy in the store…only better! This recipe keeps its shape and stays soft for a couple of days.

I couldn’t find my tiny heart cookie cutter but had to make do with just shaping the pink dough with my hands into a long heart row. Then rolling out smaller white rolls of dough and placing it around the pink dough.

Ingredients

• 3 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cup butter cold & cut into chunks
• 1 large egg
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 teaspoons liquid red food coloring

Directions

1. In a small bowl stir flour and baking powder together. Set aside. Cream butter and sugar together. Stir in egg, extracts, and vanilla. Slowly incorporate dry ingredients. Once the dough has come together, remove 2/3 of it to a separate bowl.
2. Stir in the red food coloring to the remaining 1/3 of the dough until uniform in color.
3. Roll red dough out into a 1 inch slab. Cut out heart shapes and stack them together. (Since I didn’t have the heart cookie cutter, I rolled it into a long row, shape like a heart)
4. Roll remaining regular colored dough out into long circular rows. Cover each row of stacked hearts being careful to keep them together. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate 1 hour to overnight.
5. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheet with parchment paper or silicone baking mat and set aside. Remove cookie dough logs from fridge and slice into 1/2 inch rounds. Place onto prepared baking sheet leaving 1 inch around each cookie. Bake 8-10 minutes or until cookie is barely golden brown on the bottom and isn’t shiny. Remove from oven and cool 2 minutes before cooling completely on wire rack.
6. Serve immediately or store in airtight containers for up to 3 days.