Mother's Day Cookies

Cookie Dough Ingredients:

• 3 cups flour
• 1 cup unsalted butter
• 1 cup granulated white sugar
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp. almond extract
• 1 egg
• 2 tsp. baking powder

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350° F.
2. In the bowl of your mixer, cream butter and sugar until smooth, at least 3 minutes.
3. Beat in extracts and egg.
4. In a separate bowl, combine baking powder with flour and add a little at a time to the wet ingredients. The dough will be very stiff.  If it becomes too stiff for your mixer, turn out the dough onto a countertop surface and finish off kneading the dough by hand.
5. On a flour dusted surface, roll dough to ¼” thickness and cut with cookie cutter.
6. Put cookies on a lightly greased cookie sheet.
7. Bake at 350 for 6-8 minutes. Let cool on the cookie sheet until firm enough to transfer to a cooling rack.

Royal Icing Ingredients:

• 2 lbs. powdered sugar
• 1/2 cup meringue powder
• 1 cup water, warm

Directions:

1. Beat together the meringue powder and water in your mixing bowl for a few minutes until frothy.
2. Add in the sugar, and mix together slowly until all the liquid and powdered sugar are combined.
3. If you have a stand mixer, set it at medium-high and beat the mixture together with the paddle attachment for 4 minutes.
4. Your icing should have semi-stiff peaks when the icing is ready, not floppy peaks.
5. Keep unused icing covered in an airtight container for up to a week.