Nothing beats baking Christmas cookies as a festive pastime. If you're looking for a simple Christmas biscuit recipe this vanilla sugar cookie is for you.
Serving notes: Makes 48 cookies
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Yields:
48
Prep Time:
15 mins
Cook Time:
10 mins
Total Time:
25 mins
Cal/Serv:
70
Ingredients
175g
(6oz) unsalted butter, softened
200g
(7oz) golden caster sugar
350g
(12oz) plain flour
1
medium egg
2tsp.
pure vanilla bean paste
2Tbsp.
golden icing sugar
Directions
Step 1
Preheat the oven to 200°C (180°C fan oven) mark 6. Put the butter, sugar, flour, egg and vanilla bean paste into a food processor and whiz to combine.
Step 2
Take a large sheet of baking parchment and put the dough on top. Press dough with your palm to flatten slightly, then put another sheet on top - this will stop the dough sticking. Use a rolling pin to roll out the dough to 3mm (1⁄8in) thick, then remove the top sheet of parchment.
Step 3
Using assorted 6.5cm (21⁄2in) cutters, stamp out shapes, leaving a 3mm (1⁄8in) gap between each one. Carefully remove the trimmings around the shapes, then slide the baking parchment and biscuits on to a flat baking sheet. Re-roll the trimmings between two new sheets of baking parchment, then stamp out shapes as before and slide on to another baking sheet. Bake the biscuits for 10-12min until pale golden. Cool for a few minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
Step 4
Sift icing sugar over the biscuits. Store in an airtight container for up to five days. Make a double batch and try one of these recipe variations
An experienced and highly skilled team of food writers, stylists and digital content producers, the Good Housekeeping Cookery Team is a close-knit squad of food obsessives. Cookery Editor Emma Franklin is our resident chilli obsessive and barbecue expert, who spends an inordinate amount of time on holidays poking round the local supermarkets seeking out new and exciting foods. Senior Cookery Writer Alice Shields is a former pastry chef and baking fanatic who loves making bread and would have peanut butter with everything if she could. Her favourite carb is pasta, and our vibrant green spaghetti is her weeknight go-to. Lover of all things savoury, Senior Cookery Writer Grace Evans can be found eating crispy corn and nocellara olives at every opportunity, and will take the cheeseboard over dessert any time (though she cannot resist a slice of tres leches cake). With a wealth of professional kitchen know-how, culinary training and years of experience between them, they are all dedicated to ensuring every Good Housekeeping recipe is the best it can be, so you can trust they’ll work (and if they don’t – we’ll have the answer for why*) every time (*90% of the time the answer is: “buy an separate oven thermometer”!).
