Heart Sugar Cookies with Almond Berry Icing
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After making my Naturally-Dyed Rainbow Cake and other naturally-dyed frosting, I’ve had fun continuting to experiment with natural food dyes. But this combo of natural food dyes isn’t just about avoiding artificial dyes and coming up with beautiful {natural} colors. It’s also because I simply love the combination of almond and berries.
I used one of my favorite sugar cookies: Old-Fashioned Soft Sugar Cookies. They literally melt in your mouth. My Puffy Sugar Cookies are another good choice because they are soft and yet sturdy, holding up well to handling {if dipping in the icing glazes, etc.}. I experimented with loganberries, blackberries, raspberries and blueberries. I love the almond-berry flavor combo but vanilla complements the berries well, also. You can use the same technique for a standard buttercream frosting but for these heart cookies I wanted to be able to dip the cookies into the icing for a smooth glaze finish {as I did with the naturally-dyed spinach green St. Patrick’s Day cookies from last year}.
My 4-year-old son and I had so much fun making these cookies. He was excited to make an entire pan of hearts all by himself! How do you like to celebrate Valentine’s Day with your loved ones?
- 1 cup butter, softened
- 1½ cups sugar
- 2 tsp cream of tartar
- 1 tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp salt
- 3 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla or almond extract
- 3¼ cups flour
- Powdered sugar
- Almond extract
- Frozen berries or berry juice
- Beat the butter on medium speed for 30 seconds.
- Add the sugar, cream of tartar, baking soda and salt and mix until combined.
- Mix in the eggs and vanilla.
- Gradually add the flour and mix until blended.
- Divide the dough in half, cover each half with plastic wrap and refrigerate them for at least 3 hours.
- Working with a small amount of dough at a time {and leaving the remaining dough wrapped in the refrigerator} roll out the dough on a lightly-floured surface to ¼-inch thickness.
- Cut the dough into the shapes of your choice.
- Place the cookies on an ungreased cookie sheet.
- Bake the cookies at 375 degrees for 4-7 minutes or until the edges are just starting to firm up. They will continue to set as they cool so do not over bake them or let them brown if you want soft, chewy cookies.
- Cool the cookies for one minute and then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.
- Frost and decorate them as desired.
- Place frozen berries in a small bowl (separate bowls if using different types of berries) and begin to defrost them in the microwave, for 30+ seconds, until the berries start to cook.
- Use the resulting berry juice to naturally color your icing.
- Pour powdered sugar into small bowls (as many as the different colors you would like.)
- Stir some berry juice into each one.
- Add a capful of milk and a splash of almond or vanilla extract.
- Mix all of the ingredients together to form a smooth, fairly runny icing.
- Stir in more powdered sugar or more berry juice or milk to reach your desired consistency. (I have never followed a strict recipe for this icing but have always made it to consistency.)
- Working with one cookie at a time, dip the cookie into the icing, making sure that it glazes the cookie all the way to the edges.
- Gently shake the cookie to let excess icing drip off.
- Let the iced cookies set on a cookie sheet lined with waxed paper.
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Tags: all natural frosting, almond raspberry icing, berry glazes, blackberry almond icing, blueberry almond icing, heart sugar cookies, natural food dyes, naturally-dyed frosting, naturally-dyed icing, Valentine's Day
Tue, Feb 12, 2013
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