Cooking with Butter...Soft Vanilla Cookies

Fill with preserves

As I often do, I turned to Fine Cooking Cookies Holiday edition, 2012 for a new recipe to try. You really can’t go wrong with a cookie recipe from Fine Cooking. This recipe for Soft Vanilla cookies is fairly simple to make and they are very tasty. What I found amazing was that dropping them from a cookie scoop they turned into prefect circles looking like I had rolled and cut them out. 

  We ate some with apricot jelly in-between as they suggest, using your favorite jelly or jam, and I left some just plain. If you put sugar on them, do it after they come out of the oven and before they are completely cool. They do however make a small amount of cookies and I kept the dough refrigerated as I was baking them as they have quite a bit of butter in the dough and it was warm in our kitchen.

Soft Vanilla Cookies

6 ¾ ounces (1 ½ cups) all purpose flour

Just plain to eat with your cup of coffee

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon baking powder

6 ounces (¾ cup) butter at room temperature

1 ¼ cups granulated sugar

Seeds scraped from 1 vanilla bean, or 1 ½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract

2 large eggs

  Heat oven to 375°. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. 

  In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, salt, and baking powder until vanilla well blended. In another medium bowl, beat the butter on medium-high with an electric mixer until smooth. Add the sugar and vanilla and continue beating until well combined, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs and beat until well blended about 1 minute longer. Add the flour mixture and mix on low speed until just blended.

  If your kitchen is warm, keep dough in the refrigerator when you are not using it.

  Using a 1 tablespoon cookie scoop or 2 tablespoons arrange the dough in mounds about 3 inches apart on the prepared cookie sheets. Bake until the edges are golden brown about 9 to 14 minutes. Nine minutes worked just right in my oven. Let cookies set on pans for 5 minutes before removing to rack to cool. Sprinkle with sugar when just barely warm if desired.

  They can be put together with your favorite fruit preserves or eaten just as one cookie. Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to three days or freeze for up to a month.