Friday, October 30, 2009

Halloween sugar cookies

gluten free sugar cookies
It's been a long, tiring... month. I needed to bake something, STAT. I thought sugar cookies would be a great thing to make for the pumpkin carving party I'm throwing tomorrow.

I borrowed this recipe from my man Alton Brown, sort of.

These cookies are not too sweet. They're made to be paired with icing to get that right amount of sweetness. Everyone said these tasted like the soft iced sugar cookies you get at Walmart, if that means anything to you. Bottom line, they're pretty good.

Sugar Cookies

1 c. white rice flour
1 c. millet flour (or more white rice flour, sorghum, etc.)
1/2 c. corn starch
3/4 t. baking powder
1/4 t. salt
1/4 t. xanthan gum
1/2 c. butter, softened (I used Smart Balance 50/50)
1/3 c. shortening
1 c. sugar
1 egg
1 t. vanilla

Mix the flours, baking powder, salt, and xanthan gum in a bowl. In a separate bowl cream the butter, shortening, and sugar. It should be creamy and fluffy. Beat in the egg and vanilla. Add in the dry ingredients until it forms a soft dough. If you want to roll these out, you will need to refrigerate the dough for a few hours. It rolls out well on a powdered sugar surface to keep it from sticking.

I didn't have cookie cutters and it got really old trying to carve pumpkins freehand with a knife, so I rolled them into balls and made them old school. If they're chilled, they won't spread much at all, and if they're room temp they only spread a little.

Bake them at 375 for about 5 minutes, or until the middles look set.

I'm thinking the rest of the snack-y menu will include spiced (and spiked!) apple cider, a ham & cheese tray with crackers (and bread for everyone else), and chex mix. And as soon as we have carved pumpkins, I'm thinking toasted pumpkin seeds. Mmm.

Happy Halloween!

2 comments:

Lauren said...

Yum! These cookies look delicious =D. Have a great Halloween!

Jenn/CinnamonQuill said...

These look super! I love how you used rice and millet flour!