Today we’ll be discussing the incredibly easy and delicious icing that I made for sugar cookies(and then proceeded to eat by itself). It is so much better than what you would get at the store. This was meant to be a post about making the sugar cookies but unfortunately I wasn’t happy with how they turned out. The first batch of sugar cookies I made ended up burnt, the second didn’t burn but weren’t soft and chewy like I expected at all. The problem was probably me not following directions very well, but the recipe was from a cookbook published during WWII so it might just be that we’ve had some advancements in food technology since then. Anyway, one thing that did come out PERFECT during this process was the frosting that I put together for the cookies. I normally don’t ice my cookies but my girlfriend was in the mood for that, but instead of buying it I remembered a recipe from a book I’ve been reading.
This book, Make the Bread, Buy the Butter, is a fantastic read. It describes, in detail, a womans quest to learn whether it was worth it(in effort, money, and taste quality) to make certain food items at home instead of purchasing them. She raised chickens, made marshmallows, and churned butter. Seriously, even if you don’t cook this is a really interesting book to read through.
So the original recipe makes 6 cups of icing, I didn’t need that much so I cut it down to one cup. Here’s the original along with the measurements I used:
- 3/4 pound or 3 sticks of butter (I used half a stick)
- 9 cups of powdered sugar (I used 1.5 cups)
- 1 tablespoon of vanilla extract (I used half a teaspoon)
- 2/3 cup of milk (I used 1/8 cup of skim)
The process is simple enough, beat the butter in a bowl with a mixer until it is fluffy, then pour everything else in and beat it until you have frosting! Beating took less than 2 minutes for us to get a really delicious frosting. If you have a mixer, you need to try this. Its cheaper than store-bought and tastes a lot better! The icing would probably be good on shortbread and seeing as how that is incredibly easy as well, try it out!