Heart Shaped Cookies

A super soft and flavorful sugar cookie with a sweet bite of beautifully marbled royal icing.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 30

Cook Time 15

Drying time 15

Total Time 1

Servings cookies

Calories 484kcal

Author Elizabeth Marek

Equipment

1 heart shaped cookie cutter
1 Rolling Pin

Ingredients

Sugar Cookie Dough

8 ounces Unsalted butter (1 cup)
7 ounces Granulated Sugar (1 cup)
1 large Egg Room Temperature
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
15 ounces All Purpose Flour (3 cups)
1 ½ teaspoon Baking Powder
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon Nutmeg
1 teaspoon Milk

Royal Icing

16 ounces Powdered Sugar (3 ½ cups)
2.5 ounces Pasturized Egg Whites (¼ cup)
¼ teaspoon Cream of Tartar
½ teaspoon Vanilla Extract any flavor of choice will work
1 teaspoon water (if needed) add 1 teaspoon of water at a time to get the desired consistency

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Making the Sugar Cookie Dough

Place room-temperature butter and granulated sugar in the bowl of your mixer with the paddle attachment and mix on low until smooth. The creamed butter should be fluffy and pale yellow in color. Make sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl.
Add the egg and mix on medium (4 on Kitchenaid mixer) in a stand mixer until fully incorporated. Scrape the bowl when necessary to make sure the egg incorporates.
Add the vanilla extract. Mix until just incorporated.
In a separate large bowl, whisk the flour, salt, baking powder, and spice together.
Add the flour mixture into the dough with a scoop (about ⅓ of total dry ingredients at a time) and mix until fully incorporated. Start mixer on low until flour starts to incorporate, then turn it up to medium. Scrape the bowl as needed to fully incorporate.
Add the milk once the dry ingredients are fully incorporated. Continue to mix on low until the dough becomes a solid mass.
Scrape out the mixer bowl and wrap up the sugar cookie dough in plastic wrap.
Once the dough is wrapped in plastic, Take a rolling pin and roll the dough into a flat square. ( This helps the dough chill faster and more evenly).
Place your dough in the fridge for about 20 minutes or until the dough is firm to the touch.
Once the dough has chilled, knead the dough slightly and roll it out with a large rolling pin on a lightly floured surface, about ¼ inch thick.
Use heart cookie cutters to cut out uniform heart shapes. Keep the rolled dough chilled if you are not cutting and baking right away. The dough will be more challenging to work with the warmer it is.
Place the cookies on a baking sheet lined with a piece of parchment paper. Put the cookie sheet back in the refrigerator for 10-15 minutes to chill again. This will help them avoid spreading.
Bake cookies at 350ºF for 10-14 minutes, the bake time is dependent on the size of the cookie. Cookies will be slightly golden brown on the edge, but look done in the center.
Place the baked cookies on a cooling rack to fully cool before dipping them in the icing.

Making the Marbled Icing

Combine the egg whites, powdered sugar, and cream of tartar in the bowl of your stand mixer with the whisk attachment.
Mix on low to get the ingredients combined then bump it up to high for 1-2 minutes. Add in the vanilla extract and whip until it's white. No need to mix for longer than 5 minutes.
The icing is pretty thick at this stage so we want to thin it down by adding water and mixing on low speed until we get our desired consistency.
Add water 1 teaspoon at a time until a ribbon of royal icing goes flat in 15 seconds. This is a good consistency for dipping cookies, but not too thin to have it run off the cookies.
In a small bowl, color ⅓ of your royal icing hot pink and light pink or as many colors as you desire.
Drizzle the pink and red icing over the top of the white icing.
Use a toothpick or skewer and drag up and down the icing creating a marbled effect.
Dip your cooled sugar cookies onto the surface, making sure to get the edges of your cookie dipped evenly. Pull straight up and tap off any excess icing. Pro Tip: I like to let it drip for a second and then twist it to catch the tail of the icing, keeping the edge of my cookie clean.
Wipe the cookie edges clean if any icing dripped over the edge. Place the frosted cookie on a wire rack or tray with parchment paper to dry, and watch for drips of royal icing.
There may be bubbles in the royal icing, use a straight pin or scribe to gently pop the bubbles. Then give the cookie a gentle shake to even out the frosting.
For the best results let cookies dry completely before packaging. This could take up to 16-24 hours for the icing to dry, depending on your environment. The top dries quickly but under the top shell it will still be runny and it can crack if you touch the cookies too soon. Pro-tip: Place the tray of freshly dipped cookies back in the warm (not on) oven with the door open. The warm air from the cooling oven will dry the top of the cookies faster to avoid smudging the royal icing.
The cookies are shelf stable and will stay fresh if they are stored in an airtight container. If you have any remaining dough, wrap the rest of the dough well in plastic wrap and store in the freezer until you are ready to use it.

Notes

Weigh your ingredients to avoid cookie failure. Using a kitchen scale for baking is super easy and gives you the best results every single time.
Practice Mise en Place (everything in its place). Measure out your ingredients ahead of time and have them ready before you start mixing to reduce the chances of accidentally leaving something out.
After you prepare your cookie dough, ensure you wrap it up in some plastic wrap and chill it in the refrigerator for 2 hours.
Chilled cookie dough will keep its shape in the oven and not expand or warp.

Nutrition