Unfortunately, it's no longer appropriate to hand out pint-sized Valentines to each person in the hallway.
But I still wanted to pass along a sweet gesture to my coworkers.
And rows of heart-shaped sugar cookies topped with pink icing is always a welcome gesture.
The end result is almost better than my winning Valentine box design in third grade - a two-foot tall Hershey kiss, mounted atop a heart-shaped base (and yes, my dad
may have had to use a jigsaw to help construct it).
I'm quite persnickety about sugar cookies. Here's my family's tried-and-true recipe:
Sugar CookiesIngredients:3 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup butter (leave it out until it's room temperature and soft - don't put it in the microwave to soften)
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup
sugarSift flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together. Cut in butter and blend with a pastry blender or just an electric mixer. Combine eggs, vanilla and
sugar in a separate bowl. Add to dry ingredients. Blend until well mixed. Once you're done mixing, the dough will look crumbly. Use your hands to combine the dough into a ball.
Chill dough then roll out on a floured board/sheet/counter using 1/2 c. flour and 1/2 c.
sugar. Spread some of the flour/
sugar mix on your rolling pin to keep it from sticking to to the dough.
Bake at 350 degrees F for 9 - 12 minutes. Be sure not to overbake. If the edges turn golden brown, you'll have crunchy cookies. I prefer mine softer, so I take them out just a bit earlier.
FrostingIngredients:2 cups powdered sugar
2 tbs softened butter
1/2 tsp vanilla
milk
Mix together about 2 cups powdered
sugar in a bowl with about 2 tbs softened butter and 1/2 tsp vanilla.
Pour in a touch of milk (a little bit at a time) and stir by hand.
If the consistency is too thick, add more milk. Too thin? Add more powdered
sugar. Eventually you'll get the right consistency.
I stopped at the mall after work today in search of my closet's missing link: a classic black cardigan. With piles of black garments - including six ebony sweaters - there's a hole that only a cardigan can fill. Instead, I wandered across this snowy beauty.
It hung on a clearance rack with dejected black wool coats. It was the only one in the store, happened to be a size six, and had a price tag of $129 - discounted considerably from its original price of $450. Fate.
