I have tried lots of recipes for cutout cookies and this is the best one I have found! NO FAIL SUGAR COOKIES This recipe is GREAT when using complex cookie cutters. The dough holds its' shape and won't spread during baking. Make sure you let your oven preheat for at least 1/2 hour before baking these or any other cookies. 6 cups flour 3 tsp. baking powder 2 cups butter 2 cups sugar 2 eggs 2 tsp. vanilla extract or desired flavoring (I like almond myself) 1 tsp. salt Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla. Mix well. Mix dry ingredients and add a little at a time to butter mixture. Mix until flour is completely incorporated and the dough comes together. Chill for 1 to 2 hours (or see Hint below) Roll to desired thickness and cut into desired shapes. Bake on ungreased baking sheet at 350 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes or until just beginning to turn brown around the edges. This recipe can make up to 5-dozen 3" cookies. HINT: Rolling Out Dough Without the Mess -- Rather than wait for your cookie dough to chill, take the freshly made dough and place a glob between two sheets of parchment paper. Roll it out to the desired thickness then place the dough and paper on a cookie sheet and pop it into the refrigerator. Continue rolling out your dough between sheets of paper until you have used it all. By the time you are finished, the first batch will be completely chilled and ready to cut. Reroll leftover dough and repeat the process! An added bonus is that you are not adding any additional flour to your cookies.

Here is the recipe that I have many, many times. It's not overly sweet. CREAM CHEESE COOKIES Here's my long time favorite cut out cookie dough. If I remember correctly it was originally in a BH+G magazine in the late 70's. I usually double it in my KA mixer and usually make at least three bowls of the dough. I have a very large tree shape cookie cutter (about 9") and love to make and decorate special cookies for those that love cutouts. This dough is one that you can roll thick, if you like a softer cutout, yet still holds up. 1 1/2 C sugar 1 C unsalted butter 1 8oz pkg cream cheese 1 egg 1 tsp vanilla 1/2 tsp almond extract 3 1/2 C flour (I like unbleached) 1 tsp baking powder In a mixing bowl cream sugar, butter and cream cheese until fluffy. Add egg and flavorings, beat smooth' Stir together the flour and baking powder, add to creamed mixture and mix thoroughly. FOR CUT-OUT COOKIES Chill dough. Roll out on surface dusted with a mixture of 1/2 powered sugar and 1/2 flour, 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick depending on your preference. Cut into desired shapes. Place on ungreased cookie sheet ( I line with parchment paper) and bake in a 375� oven 8-10 minutes. Watch for the edges to just barely begin to brown if you like a moist cookie. Cool and frost. COOKIE PRESS COOKIES Divide dough into portions and add desired colors. Force through cookie press onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake in a 375� oven 8-10 minutes. Remove from cookie sheet and cool on wire rack. Before baking brush with slightly beaten egg white and sprinkle with colored sprinkles if desired. Note...I have added about 4 oz of almond paste to the dough when making the cookie press cookies.....yum! FAVORITE ICING FOR CUTOUT COOKIES 2 c powered sugar, sifted 2 Tbsp softened butter 1/4 tsp vanilla 1/4 tsp almond extract 1 egg white 1/4 C milk or cream Combine egg white and milk, set aside. Beat together powered sugar, butter and flavorings. Add small amounts of the milk mixture until icing is spreading consistency. Tint with desired colors. Using the egg white will give you a nice finish on the icing, the butter will keep it soft on the inside. Nancy

Two to three days. As chi83 points out, it will begin to dry out. Store the dough in a close-fitting plastic bag, plastic wrap, or foil -- with as much air removed as possible to help preventing the dough from drying out. You also have to take into account raw eggs in the dough (if the recipe contains raw, unpasteurized, eggs). For that reason I would NOT vacuum-seal the dough because if any bacteria is present, it can continue to grow into a toxin under the right conditions in the oxygen-free environment of a vacuum-sealed bag/jar/canister, even at refrigerator temperatures. Vacuum-sealing will NOT lengthen the storage time if there is raw egg in it. Bacteria (potentially from raw eggs) just grows slower in the refrigerator than at temperatures in the "Danger Zone" 40-140-degrees F. And since most people don't know what their refrigerator temperatures are, they can already be in the danger zone. -Grainlady

Thank you all! My cookies are Swedish, too, colleenoz! All the cookies I make for Christmas are either Swedish or Danish, handed down from my Danish grandmother (who married a Swede). Your recipe is probably just like mine. With equal amounts finely ground nuts and flour, they break apart in your mouth in a flurry of tender texture and flavor. For the first time ever, we had problems with the recipe, which is why they didn’t all get baked. We didn’t know whether to blame the new oven (which was a problem for pretty much everything) or a difference in the dough. I think maybe both. Instead of the normal 20 minutes at 350 to get slightly brown on the bottom, they took 40 minutes plus. Then, they shattered when trying to roll them in powdered sugar. I’m not good at analyzing a problem and knowing how to fix it. We used to buy the pecans pre-ground. The nut store we bought them at went out of business. We bought a 3 lb bag of whole pecans and ground them ourselves in the food processor. Last year went fine. This year the dough seemed too moist. We had a problem even forming the balls, then they shattered as I wrote above. I was in the process of adding more flour to compensate, and doing test bakes, when I decided it was time to pull the plug and stop baking. I think the pecans must have been very fresh, and were too moist. We ground them a couple of days ahead and I should have turned them and let them dry a bit, instead of covering the bowl. I noticed the ground pecans were moist, but I didn’t do anything with the knowledge. The pecan meal I used to buy pre-ground was much drier. Either that or leave out the 3 T of water the recipe calls for.