December is a tough month for football fans. Whether your team is winning or losing, you probably feel stressed watching the games and on top of that you have to attend holiday parties! Unfortunately when it comes to the holidays, sometimes the scheduling doesn’t allow you to work around your team the way you can in September/October/November so you just need to suck it up and hope your party has the game on or stream it on your phone. In the meantime, what are you going to bring to the party? Or better yet, if you don’t have a party but want to be festive, what are you going to make? Well I am definitely not Chef Nick or a pastry chef of any kind, but when December hits, all I want is holiday cookies! I could 100% be on Nailed It! (if you’re not watching Nailed It on Netflix please advise YOU MUST) so please bear with me on this one, I am making Team Spirit Holiday Sugar Cookies for the football and holiday fans in the room! In our Lazy Sundays post I mentioned my deep love for the Pillsbury ready-bake sugar cookies, but I can ONLY eat them warm otherwise they get hard and cardboard-y. I’ve been on the hunt for a great sugar cookie recipe to replace these in my life and I think I found one! I’ll let you be the judge…
The Recipe
- 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature (2 sticks)
- 1 cup + 2 tbsp granulated sugar
- 2 tbsp brown sugar
- 1 egg
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- Holiday sprinkle/jimmies or anything fun
- Team color gel icing
- Slice of bread (to keep the cookies moist)
- Glass of milk to go with it- this is merely a suggestion
The Method
*Before we even get into the method, the recipe calls for ROOM temperature butter, so before you even pre-heat the oven, take that butter (2 sticks) out of the refrigerator, otherwise you will just be sitting around with a hot oven.
– PREHEAT the oven to 350°F and line two baking sheets with either parchment paper or my personal favorite silicone baking mats (holiday wish list item if you don’t already have this!)
– COMBINE dry ingredients in a medium sized bowl. This includes your flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Mix and set aside.
– CREAM the butter and sugars- yes both granulated and brown sugar are used in this recipe so don’t forget the brown! At this point I am using my KitchenAid Stand Mixer but you can use a hand mixer also! Creaming the butter and sugar should create a fluffy light-colored mixture, so keep mixing until this is achieved.
– ADD the last of the wet ingredients, one at a time. First add 1 egg and continue to mix. Add vanilla extract and mix this well!
– STOP mixing and ADD the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients in the mixer bowl.
– MIX on a medium speed. The dough will be thick, mix until combined. DO NOT OVER MIX here, once all of the ingredients appear incorporated you’ve done your job!
– BALL the dough. Create 1-1.5 tablespoon balls (I do this by eye, but an ice cream scooper or regular spoon could also be used for uniformity. *NOTE you can roll these in granulated sugar for a shiny finish. **You can freeze cookie dough, this batter makes lots of dough so I opted to freeze to make these another night while watching Xmas movies!
– BAKE cookie 7-8 minutes. My experience with this recipe suggests they will spread but remain slightly puffy. DO NOT OVER COOK these, they will cook a little more when you take them out of the oven. Feel free to give these a press down in the center to give a flat surface for decorating (I didn’t do that because I love a fluffy sugar cookie).
– DECORATE with your team colors and if you are talented enough logo (I am not). Add some decorative holiday sprinkles- note these cookies are not wet cookies you can add sprinkles to, the gel icing will be needed to have anything stick but I like a cleaner look!
– SERVE to your football friends or holiday party crowd (a glass of milk goes great with these!).
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