With crisp edges, thick centers, and room for lots of decorating icing, I know you’ll love these soft cut-out sugar cookies. Use your favorite cookie cutters and try my classic royal icing.
Originally published on my website in 2014, this recipe is a massive fan favorite. You’ll also find the recipe in my New York Times best-selling cookbook, Sally’s Baking 101.
This is my flagship recipe for cut-out sugar cookies. I’ve made them at least 38577 times (imagine all the butter), so I figured it’s time to share new recipe tips, a video tutorial, and more helpful information.
Why You’ll Love These Sugar Cookies
- Soft, thick centers with slightly crisp edges
- Irresistible buttery vanilla flavor
- Leave plain or flavor with extras like maple, cinnamon, and more
- Hold their shape
- Flat surface for decorating
- Stay soft for days
- Freeze beautifully
Sugar Cookies Video Tutorial
Overview: How to Make Sugar Cookies with Icing
- Make cookie dough. You only need 7 or 8 ingredients. With so few ingredients, it’s important that you follow the recipe closely. Creamed butter and sugar provide the base of the cookie dough. Flour and egg give the cookies structure, and vanilla extract adds flavor. I almost always add a touch of almond extract for additional flavor and highly recommend that you try it too! Baking powder adds lift, and salt balances the sweet. So many *little ingredients* doing *big jobs* to create a perfect cookie. By the way, I also have a recipe for chocolate sugar cookies!
- Divide in two pieces. Smaller sections of dough are easier to roll out.
- Roll out cookie dough. Roll it out to 1/4 inch thick. If you have difficulty rolling out dough evenly, try this adjustable rolling pin. Speaking from experience—it’s incredibly handy!
- Chill rolled-out cookie dough. Without chilling, these cookie cutter sugar cookies won’t hold their shapes. Chill the rolled-out cookie dough for at least 2 hours or up to 2 days.
- Cut into shapes. If you need suggestions for cookie cutters, I love Ann Clark brand. (Not sponsored, just a genuine fan!) Some of my favorites include this heart set, dog bone, snowflake, snowman, leaf, and a pumpkin. I also use and recommend these heart cookie cutters.
- Bake & cool. Depending on size, the cookies take about 11–12 minutes.
- Decorate. See my suggested icings below. I also have a tutorial on how to decorate sugar cookies with even more helpful decorating tips.
Have a little flour nearby when you’re rolling out the cookie dough. Keep your work surface, hands, and rolling pin lightly floured. This is a relatively soft dough.
The Trick Is the Order of Steps
Notice how I roll out the dough BEFORE chilling it in the refrigerator? That’s my trick and you can see me doing it in the video tutorial in this post.
Let me explain why I do this. Just like when you’re making chocolate chip cookies, to prevent the cookies from over-spreading, the cookie dough must chill in the refrigerator. Roll out the dough right after you prepare it, then chill the rolled-out dough. (At this point the dough is too soft to cut into shapes.) If you chill the cookie dough and then try to roll it out, it will be too cold and difficult to work with.
I also divide the dough in half before rolling it out, and highly recommend you do the same. Smaller sections of dough are simply more manageable.
Another trick! Roll out the cookie dough directly on a silicone baking mat or parchment paper so you can easily transfer it to the refrigerator. (Parchment paper will slide around on your counter, so I always place a piece of parchment paper on top of a silicone baking mat to roll the dough without slippage.)
Pick up the sheet of parchment with the rolled-out dough on top, transfer it to a baking sheet, and place it in the refrigerator. You don’t need to make room for two baking sheets in your refrigerator—simply stack the pieces of rolled-out dough on top of each other, with the parchment paper in between.
How Thick Do I Roll Sugar Cookies?
These sugar cookies remain soft because they’re rolled out pretty thick. Roll out the cookie dough to about 1/4 inch thick or just under 1/4 inch thick. Yes, this is on the thicker side and yes, this produces extra thick and soft cookies. If rolling out cookie dough doesn’t sound appealing, try my drop sugar cookies instead.
Sugar Cookie Icing
I have 3 sugar cookie icing recipes, and you can choose whichever works best for you.
- Favorite Royal Icing: This royal icing is my preferred sugar cookie icing because it’s easy to use, dries within a couple of hours, and doesn’t taste like hardened cement. (It’s on the softer side!) I make it with meringue powder. Meringue powder takes the place of raw egg whites, which is found in traditional royal icing recipes. It eliminates the need for fresh eggs, but still provides the same consistency. You can find meringue powder in some baking aisles, most craft stores with a baking section, and online. The 8-ounce tub always lasts me a good while. The trickiest part is landing on the perfect royal icing consistency, but I provide a video in the royal icing recipe to help you.
- Easy Cookie Icing: This easy cookie icing is ideal for beginners. It’s easier to make than royal icing because you don’t need an electric mixer and the consistency won’t really make or break the outcome. However, it doesn’t provide the same sharp detail that royal icing decorations do. It also takes a good 24 hours to dry.
- Buttercream: This cookie decorating buttercream is also excellent for beginners. You can tint it any color you like, flavor it, and spread it on with a knife or use piping tips. It soft-sets after a few hours, meaning you can carefully stack the cookies for storage.
The pictured heart-shaped cookies are decorated with my royal icing using Wilton piping tip #4. If you’re not into piping tips, you can simply dunk the tops of the cookies into the icing, like we do with these mini animal cracker cookies. 🙂
Sugar Cookie Tips & Tools
Before I leave you with the recipe, let me suggest some useful sugar cookie tools. These are the exact products I use and trust in my own kitchen:
- Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand Mixer)
- Baking Sheets
- Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Sheets
- Rolling Pin or this Adjustable Rolling Pin
- Food Coloring: Liquid food coloring can alter the consistency of the icing, so I recommend gel food coloring. For the pictured cookies, I used a few drops of dusty rose and 1 drop of sky blue. This Americolor Soft Gel Paste Color Kit is great to have if you do a lot of decorating and want to have a variety of colors on hand.
- Piping Tips/Squeeze Bottle: If you’re using royal icing, I recommend Wilton piping tip #4 for outlining and flooding. This is a wonderful basic piping tip to have in your collection. If you’re using my easy glaze icing, I recommend using a squeeze bottle.
- Piping Bag: If you’re using royal icing and a piping tip, you need a disposable piping bag or reusable piping bag.
- Couplers: Couplers are handy if you have multiple colors of icing and only 1 tip, and need to move the tip to the other bags of icing.
- Cookie Cutters: I like this heart-shaped cookie cutter, but you can use any shape you desire!
For even more recommendations, see this complete list of my favorite cookie decorating supplies.
Here’s What You Can Do With This Dough
- Christmas Sugar Cookies
- Striped Fudge Cookie Sandwiches
- Snowman Cookies
- Cinnamon Roll Cookies
- Stained Glass Window Cookies
- Valentine’s Day Cookies
- Maple Cinnamon Cut-Out Cookies
- St. Patrick’s Day Cookies
- Easter Cookies
- Fireworks Cookies
And if you’re craving sugar cookies with a little extra tang, try my cream cheese cut-out cookies with Nutella glaze.
Print
Soft Cut-Out Sugar Cookies
- Prep Time: 40 minutes
- Cook Time: 12 minutes
- Total Time: 3 hours (including chilling)
- Yield: 24 3-4 inch cookies
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
With crisp edges, thick centers, and room for lots of decorating icing, I know you’ll love these soft sugar cookies as much as I do. The number of cookies this recipe yields depends on the size of the cookie cutter you use. If you’d like to make dozens of cookies for a large crowd, double the recipe. This recipe is also in my New York Times best-selling cookbook, Sally’s Baking 101.
Ingredients
- 2 and 1/4 cups (281g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled), plus more as needed for rolling and work surface
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup (12 Tbsp; 170g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 3/4 cup (150g) granulated sugar
- 1 large egg, at room temperature
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon almond extract (optional, but makes the flavor outstanding)*
For Decorating
- Royal Icing, Easy Glaze Icing, or Cookie Buttercream (royal icing is pictured)
- Assorted sprinkles
Instructions
- In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, and salt together. Set aside.
- In a large bowl using a handheld or a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter and sugar together on high speed until the mixture is light and creamy, about 3 minutes. Add the egg, vanilla, and almond extract (if using) and beat on high speed until combined, about 1 minute. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl and beat again as needed to combine. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix on low speed until combined. The dough should be soft. If it seems too soft and sticky for rolling, beat in 1 more Tablespoon of flour.
- Divide the dough in half. Place each portion on a piece of lightly floured parchment paper or a lightly floured silicone baking mat. With a lightly floured rolling pin, roll the dough to about 1/4-inch thickness. Use a bit more flour if the dough seems too sticky. The rolled-out dough can be any shape, as long as it is evenly 1/4 inch thick.
- Lightly dust one of the rolled-out dough portions with flour. (This prevents sticking.) Place the second rolled-out dough portion, still on the parchment paper, on top of the first. Cover the dough tightly and refrigerate it for at least 2 hours and up to 2 days.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C). Line large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
- Carefully remove the top piece of dough from the refrigerator. If it’s sticking to the bottom, run your hand under it to help remove it. Using a cookie cutter, cut the dough into shapes. Gather the scraps, reroll, and continue cutting until all the dough is used. (Note: It doesn’t seem like a lot of dough, but you get a lot of cookies from the dough scraps you reroll.) Repeat with the second piece of dough. Arrange the cookies 3 inches apart on the prepared baking sheets.
- Bake for 11–12 minutes or until the edges of the cookies are very lightly browned and set. If your oven has hot spots, rotate the baking sheets halfway through bake time. Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely before decorating.
- Decorate the cooled cookies with royal icing, easy cookie icing, or cookie decorating buttercream. Feel free to tint any of the icings with gel food coloring. See post above for recommended decorating tools. No need to cover the decorated cookies as you wait for the icing to set. If it’s helpful, decorate the cookies directly on a baking sheet so you can place the entire baking sheet in the refrigerator to help speed up the icing setting.
- Enjoy cookies right away or wait until the icing sets to serve them. Once the icing has set, these cookies are great for gifting or shipping. Store plain or iced cookies covered tightly at room temperature for up to 5 days. For longer storage, cover and refrigerate for up to 10 days. If decorated with cookie buttercream, cover and store decorated cookies at room temperature for up to 1 day, or in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.
Notes
- Freezing Instructions: Plain or decorated sugar cookies freeze well for up to 3 months. Wait for the icing to set completely before layering between sheets of parchment paper in a freezer-safe container. To thaw, thaw in the refrigerator or at room temperature. You can also freeze the cookie dough (before rolling it out) for up to 3 months. Prepare the dough through step 2, divide in half, flatten each half into a disc (like we do with pie crust), wrap each disc in plastic wrap, place both wrapped discs in a freezer-safe container, and freeze. Thaw the wrapped discs in the refrigerator overnight, then bring to room temperature for about 1 hour. Roll out the dough as directed in step 4, then chill the rolled-out dough in the refrigerator for 1 hour before cutting into shapes and baking.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand Mixer) | Baking Sheets | Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Paper | Wooden Rolling Pin or Adjustable Rolling Pin | Heart-Shaped Cookie Cutter | Americolor Soft Gel Paste Color Kit | Piping Bags (Disposable or Reusable) | Couplers | Wilton Tip #4 | Squeeze Bottle
- Room Temperature: Room-temperature butter is essential. If the dough is too sticky, your butter may have been too soft. Room-temperature butter is actually cool to the touch. Room-temperature egg is preferred so that it mixes quickly and evenly into the cookie dough.
- Flavors: I love flavoring this cookie dough with 1/4 teaspoon almond extract as listed in the ingredients above. For more flavor, use 1/2 teaspoon. Instead of the almond extract, try using 1 teaspoon of maple extract, coconut extract, lemon extract, or peppermint extract. Or add 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice or ground cinnamon. If using lemon extract, you can also add 1 Tablespoon lemon zest.
- Icing: Use royal icing, easy cookie icing, or cookie decorating buttercream. See post above to read about the differences.
- Can I Double the Recipe? Yes. Double all of the ingredients and divide the dough into 3 or 4 portions in step 3.
- Be sure to check out my top 5 cookie baking tips AND these are my 10 must-have cookie baking tools.
Reader Comments and Reviews
The taste of these cookies were great, but they were completely useless when it came to having cookies that you could roll and cut into fun shapes. The recipe said to add a little flour if it was too wet – I ended up ruining a batch adding so much flour where it was STILL sticky. After fridging the cookies, I went to try cutting them and they were completely stuck to the paper. Scraped everything off to roll out again with more flour and stuck to that. I ended up giving up and making normal cookies, but this recipe also spreads when being baked so now I have really flat, misshapen cookies.
Would these taste good without icing and just with sprinkles and other toppings/decorations like that? I wasn’t sure they maybe wouldn’t be sweet enough without the icing?
Hi Megan, These are great without icing too!
These cookies are delicious!!! I actually like my sugar cookies thin and a tad crispy rather than soft. These rolled out perfectly and the flavor is spectacular! I used your icing recipe as well. Excellent!! Thanks for sharing your expertise.
Can I use this to make pinwheel style cookies?
Yes! We use this dough to make these fun cinnamon roll cookies.
I tried your recipe to the t and it has to be one of the worst cookie recipes I’ve ever came across and I’ve been cooking for over 50 years
Steven vanier
Presque isle Maine
I made the dough and put in refrigerator before reading the entire recipe to roll it out before putting in refrigerator Any suggestions? Can I make it into a different type of cookie! Help! Thank you
I made these a week ago and froze them. Baked them at a later date and now they are in the fridge till I frost them. I pulled one out of the fridge due to a craving and it was the best sugar cookie I’ve had.
I had absolutely no trouble with this recipe. Instead of rolling with flour I rolled between two sheets of parchment then slid onto a tray and put in the freezer for less than 5 mins to get slightly firm for cutting. It was a very fast process.
I took each cut out and placed in layers (with parchment between each layer) into the freezer. Once I cut all the cookies I took the first batch and wrapped in wax paper then put in a bag placed into a small brownie tin to lay flat and freeze overnight.
A few days later when I had time I baked. They held their shape and look professionally baked.
Great recipe and compared to many others it does not use a ton of butter which is great during the holidays when baking peaks.
Strongly recommend this recipe – no adjustments needed.
Every recipe I try from you is amazing. My go to spot for everything baking related. These were amazing. I went with 1/2 tsp of almond extract along with the vanilla extract and that was perfect for my taste. Keep these amazing recipes coming ❤️
These cookies are always a hit when I make them! I plan to make/decorate them and give them out this Christmas. I’m assuming all the negative reviews are either coming from those who don’t like sugar cookies or they just didn’t make them correctly. 10/10 recipe! Thank you!
These have become my go to Christmas cookies recipe! They always turn out soft and delicious. The ones that give a horrible review clearly aren’t measuring correctly or baking too long.
This turned out fantastic! Definitely a winner, they came out perfect. I put a couple drops of lemon oil in glaze and these guys are delicious!
I’ve made this several times already this year, best sugar cookie recipe ever!!!!!! Adding the almond extract is a must and the royal icing recipe is perfect too.
I love this recipe. It turned out so great and simply delicious.
Hi Sally! Can I use this recipe with cookie stamps or do you recommend another recipe? I googled “embossed cookie recipes” but I trust your site the most
Hi Carmela, Yes! If you stamp the cookie dough, chill the stamped cookie dough shapes right before baking– they’ll definitely hold their shape. We suggest chilling the shaped cookies for 1 hour prior to baking. We’ve used this recipe to make stamped cookies before and they came out beautifully!
Hi Sally!
Could i divide this into two balls and then refrigerate it? I want to do the actual roll out and cut in a few days. Thanks!
Hi Julia! After chilling for two days the dough will be quite hard to roll out. But you could let it come to room temperature, then continue with the recipe at step 4 (chilling the rolled out dough again). Enjoy!
These are so good! And addictive! Great texture and flavor. I’ve made multiple times and it’s fabulous every time. Everyone that’s tried it always comes back for more. Buttercream frosting goes great with these cookies.
These are 100% the best sugar cookies I have ever made. I have made them multiple times. And as soon as the cookies are gone my 4 y.o. little helper asks when can we make cookies again. I brought these to a cookie exchange Christmas Party and everyone was asking for the recipe. One of them even said that these are bakery level good! Thank you for this amazing recipe. I will use it for years to come
Hi Sally,
I made this dough four days ago and wasn’t able to bake them right away. The dough has been stored air tight in the fridge. Do you think the dough is still safe to use?
Hi Meg! We usually only recommend storing in the refrigerator for up to two days, but always, you can do what you’re comfortable with!
Can you use self rising flour and then omit the things that are not in AP flour.
Hi Sandra, we don’t recommend using self rising flour in this recipe. It would take additional recipe testing to ensure accurate results.
Great recipe! I took a few shortcuts that sped up the process but I don’t think detracted from the flavor – cut out the cookies without chilling the dough first, froze the cookie shapes for 1/2 hour, and froze them for 5 minutes out of the oven to chill. Absolutely delicious! Just stick to 1/2 tsp of almond extract so it’s not too overpowering. I also highly recommend placing the same cookie shapes on the same baking sheet. Different shapes cook at different times so you might need to take one pan out earlier than the others. You’ll know it’s done when the dough looks matte on top. Look this easy soft cookie dough! Didn’t spread very much either.
My cookies crack when baking. How can I prevent that from happbening?
Hi Bobby! Was your dough quite dry? How did you measure the flour? Make sure to spoon and level (instead of scooping) to avoid packing in too much flour into your measuring cups. You can read more about properly measuring baking ingredients in this post.
Do you have a video on making the cookies into a tree. Oh, and I adore the almond. Thanks for sharing your time and talent
Just made these with my friends and the dough was soft and delicious! thankyou for the recipe I will defitnely be using this for all my cookies in the future!!!
I’ve been looking for a yummy yet sure-fire sugar cookie recipe for a couple of years. Your is definitely the winner! I carefully followed the directions and am pleased to say they do not stick–to anything! Not the rolling pin, not the counter, not parchment. The video was super helpful, as are the easy to follow, detailed directions. Thank you so much. Also, wanting a lemon cookie, I used the vanilla plus two tablespoons of lemon zest. Delicious!
This was a pretty simple recipe and the taste was fine compared to the other recipes I made. However I would not recommend stacking your rolled out dough on each other. It causes the dough to crack and is hard to unstick, defeats the purpose of pre rolling them before cooling. Overall I’d say this recipe is a 5/10
Hi Olivia! Make sure to sprinkle the rolled dough with flour and layer with parchment paper as directed to avoid the layers sticking together. Thanks for giving this recipe a try!
Hi Sally!
I absolutely love your page! I made a batch of these cookies yesterday and they came our beautiful and tasty! My only issue is that they were pretty dry and crumbly (more like a shortbread).
I followed the recipe to a T so I’m confused at what I may have done wrong – any tips for that? I was really looking forward to the chewy 🙂 lol
Hi Dayna, how did you measure your flour? We recommend spooning and leveling (or weight measurement), otherwise there could be too much flour in the dough, causing it to dry out. Over baking can also dry out cookies, so for next time you can try a minute or two less in the oven. Hope this helps and thanks so much for giving these a try!
Wonderful thanks! I used my measuring cups and thought I had it pretty level but next time i will definitely use a spoon. I do think it is more likely that I overbaked. After 12 min I opened the oven and did not see any golden tone so I did an additional 3 min for a total of 15 min. I think that’s definitely too long for this thin cookies! Thanks again – amazing recipe – and stacking a refrigerating was such a great method!
can I use salted butter if I don’t have any unsalted butter?
Hi Roberta, If using salted butter you can reduce the added salt in the cookie dough from 1/4 teaspoon to 1/8 teaspoon. Happy baking!
Made these this afternoon to try for cookie exchange next week. My new favorite sugar cookie recipe. So easy! I used almond and vanilla…delicious! Also because of the size of my Christmas cookie cutters I got 20 cookies. Will be making more this weekend.
Hi! Thank you for making this page its so great! Question: I’m making cookie kits for a class and was wondering how long royal icing will stay good in a piping bag? Can I make this ahead of time, 1-2 days ahead?
Thank you!
Hello! Icing is fine at room temperature for up to 3 days. After that, it’s best to refrigerate it.
Presumably it spoils just as quickly after being put on the cookie? So the cookies themselves will keep for five days at room temperature (and then will probably only start to harden, not actually spoil), but if you decorate them with homemade royal icing, the icing will go bad sooner than that?
I tried out several recipes for both cookies and icing this year. This was the best cookie recipe of the four I tried, but NONE of the homemade icings worked as well as storebought for my purposes. The taste and texture were a little better, but I couldn’t get them darker than pastel no matter how much food coloring I added, and they all included ingredients that would spoil quickly. (Most of them used milk, so they would probably go bad after a lot less than three days at room temperature!) Do you know of any way around those drawbacks, or should I keep using storebought icing if I need vivid colors and a good shelf life?
This cookie recipe is really good. I have made it several times and I will not use any other recipe it’s that good! I just haven’t been successful with the royal icing, although it tastes great it is hard to work with. It is probably me though.
Lemon zest will do the trick
Oh my! Loved this recipe! Just finished baking. I love almond with vanilla so that sold me on the recipe. I cannot thank you enough for the tip to roll out dough before placing in the fridge. Made so much sense! I have so much more enthusiasm to make these cut out cookies in the future. I cannot wait to try the chocolate version of this cookie. Your recipe for inside out cookies is our new family favorite!
Thank you so much for your positive feedback, Michelle! These cookies are definitely a favorite – enjoy!
I completely agree. Not only when we have made sugar cookies in the past do they fall apart, and spread in the oven, but they don’t tend to taste well. Not this recipe; the cookies come out soft, never break (When we made your recipe not one broke!) and taste amazing. The idea of putting vanilla extract (a personal favorite,) and almond extract was genius. Although I love this recipe, my favorite part of the recipe is rolling out the dough, then placing it in the refrigerator! You’ve completely changed the way my family feels when it’s time to make sugar cookies. I can’t wait to make some more for the Holiday season- Thank you dearly