Spray Painted Sugar Cookies

I know Valentine's day is long gone but I was asked to make heart shaped sugar cookies for a church activity last week. I was kind of excited because I bought some fun Wilton heart shaped cookie cutters a few years ago and I still haven't used them. This gave me the perfect reason to test them out. They were awesome. They came in a 4 pack of different sizes and two of the edges were straight and two of them had "squiggly" edges. I don't really know how to describe them. You can see the different outlines of the hearts in the pictures.

I also bought these awesome Wilton color mist cans a little while ago and I have only used them once. They look awesome. Everyone kept asking me how I got the cookies to look like that. It is really easy to use. Just make sure to keep the can about a foot away when you spray the cookies or they'll be splotchy and the color will run. You also want to put the cookies on a cookie sheet when you do it.

The recipe and frosting I used came from In Katrina's Kitchen

This recipe was awesome because I made the dough and baked the cookies all within an hour. It's a great recipe to work with when you are crunched for time and everyone said that they were delicious. I made 30 cookies and I only came home with 6.

The sugar cookies and frosting both call for almond extract which I didn't have. They tasted great without it but maybe next time I'll try it.

Ingredients:
1 Cup butter, softened
1 Cup granulated white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 egg
2 teaspoons baking powder
3 cups all purpose flour

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350° F.
2. In the bowl of your mixer cream butter and sugar until smooth.
3. Beat in extracts and eggs.
4. In a separate bowl combine baking powder with flour and add a little at a time to the wet ingredients. The dough will be very stiff. If it becomes too stiff for your mixer turn out the dough onto a counter top surface. Wet your hands and finish off kneading the dough by hand.
5. DO NOT CHILL THE DOUGH. Divide into workable batches, roll out onto a floured surface and cut. You want these cookies to be on the thicker side (closer to 1/4 inch rather than 1/8).
6. Bake at 350 for 6-8 minutes. Let cool on the cookie sheet until firm enough to transfer to a cooling rack.

I used her butter cream frosting recipe found here. It was the best cookie frosting I've ever worked with. It was the perfect consistency of soft but not too soft. I was able to stack the cookies without the frosting sticking to the other cookies. I will warn you though that this recipe makes a ton! I have enough frosting for probably another 6 dozen cookies. I have no idea what I'm going to do with it all.


Butter cream frosting
Ingredients:

• 2 Cups shortening
• 1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon almond extract 
• 8 Cups powdered sugar
• 1/8 Cup heavy cream (more or less to desired consistency) (I didn't have any so I used 2% milk)
•  food coloring, if desired  

Directions:
      1. In the bowl of your mixer beat shortening until smooth and creamy.
      2. Mix in vanilla (and almond extract if using).
      3. Add powdered sugar (1 cup at a time) until combined, then add  cream & mix until smooth and                    spreading consistency. Adjust cream to desired frosting thickness
      4. Add a few drops of color, if desired.