Butter Cookies for Lazy People

Tomorrow is the first day of school and I'm going through serious summer withdrawals. Kind of regret not doing more than binging anime, eating, and playing Pokemon Go. Back to stress and sadness :). Hah by the end of this year I bet I'll be sad that I'm leaving because 'absence makes the heart grow fonder' but for now I'm already done with school.

I got the original recipe from allrecipes.com (http://allrecipes.com/recipe/10011/butter-cookies-ii) which I have made in the past, but while making it I realized that I could make this a one bowl recipe that needs minimal measuring tools. So I hope you like my little variation to make your life easier, especially if you're like me and absolutely hate washing dishes.

My life hack which made the original recipe into a much easier one was to change the flour to 1/2 cup which means that for all the 1 cup measurements, just use the 1/2 cup. That way at the end you only have to wash the 1/2 cup and not both 1 cup and 1/3 cup. Another change I made was to add the salt in when I added the vanilla extract. The original recipe said to mix the salt and flour in a separate bowl before adding to the wet ingredients, but I didn't think that mixing a heaping pinch of salt with such a huge amount of flour would make a huge difference from just mixing the salt in first and then the flour. There was no problem in doing so. The world did not end.

Recipe

1 cup butter

1 cup sugar

1 egg

3 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp salt

2 1/2 cup all purpose flour

Directions

1. Beat together butter and sugar until fluffy.

2. Add in egg and mix.

3. Add in vanilla extract and salt. Mix again.

4. Add in the flour 1 cup at a time. Add one cup then mix. Add the second cup then mix. Then add in the 1/2 cup at the end and mix again.

5. Scrape the sides of the bowl and chill in the fridge for ~45 minutes.

6. Roll out the dough about 1/4 inch thick and cut into shapes. Add sprinkles if desired.

7. Bake at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for 9 minutes or until the edges are golden brown. Then enjoy!

Rainbow Center Butter Cookies

Ingredients:

1 cup butter(2 sticks) 

1 cup white sugar

1 egg

2 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 2/3 cup all purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

7 rolls of sweet tart circles (mini kind)

Directions:

1. Preheat pven to 400°F. 

2. Combine butter and sugar in electric mixer and mix until light and fluffy.

2. Mix in egg and vanilla. Mix until fully combined. 

3. In a separate bowl, whisk together flour and salt. 

4. Mix flour mixture into the electric mixer until everything had come together. 

5. Roll out dough to about 1/3 inch thickness and cut out shapes. Place a candy in the middle of each. 

6. Bake for abou 10 minutes or until the edges are golden brown. 

Brownie Cookies

I now realize what one is supposed to do on a blog. Basically rant about life in a deep way. Every other friday I basically cry about chemistry (or math) and lament about my problems to my dog. The bane of my existence. Honestly I wanted to make cream puffs but the recipe I tried was screwed up and they came out as butter cardboard disks. Not fun times. So to make myself feel better, as redemption, I made these cookies because they taste good and you literally cannot screw these up intentionally. I wish i could have this redemption in my educational system. Can I just go to school in Finland? Enjoy baking!

Recipe:

Ingredients: 

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp baking powder 

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter

3/4 cup sugar 

1 egg

1/2 cup cocoa powder

Directions: 

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. 

2. Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt together in a bowl.

3. In a stand mixer (or hand mixer) cream together the butter and sugar. Then add the egg, vanilla extract, and cocoa powder. Mix until well combined.

4. Slowly add in your flour mixture and your batter should look like the picture above.

5. Roll out cookie dough (in my opinion chilling the dough isnt worth the time) into 1/4 inch thickness. Cut out your cookies. 

6. Place the cookies on a parchment lined baking tray and bake for 8-10 minutes or until the edges are firm and the middle is slightly soft. 

7. Place on cooling rack for a couple minutes before enjoying 1 or 2 or 5 of these delicious cookie-brownie hybrids.