Sugar Cookies, Old Fashioned

By MarieR

Ingredients

• 4 sticks (2 cups; 1 pound) butter melted
• 2 cups powdered sugar not sifted
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest optional
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon cream of tartar, critical
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 4 1/2 cups flour not sifted
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar for later

Details

Servings 1

Preparation

Step 1

Do not preheat oven yet- dough must chill before baking.

Melt butter. Add sugars and mix.
Let cool to room temperature and mix in the eggs, one at a time.
Then add the vanilla, lemon zest, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt.
Mix well. Add flour in increments, mixing after each addition.
Chill dough for at least one hour. (Overnight is fine.)
When you're ready to bake, preheat oven to 325 degrees and place rack in the middle of the oven.

Use hands to roll dough in walnut-sized balls. Roll dough balls in a bowl of white sugar.
(Mix white sugar 2 to I with colored sugar far holidays-green for St. Pat's Day, red and green for Christmas, multicolored for birthdays.)
Place on a greased cookie sheet, 12 to a standard sheet. Flatten dough balls with a greased spatula.
Bake at 325 degrees for 10-15 minutes. (They should have a tinge of gold on the top.) Cool on cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then remove to a rack to finish cooling. They can be decorated with frosting piped from a pastry bag for special occasions or left just as they are.