A sugar cookie is a

cookie A cookie is a baked or cooked snack or dessert that is typically small, flat and sweet. It usually contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of oil, fat, or butter. It may include other ingredients such as raisins, oats, chocolate chips, nu ...

with the main ingredients being

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or do ...

flour Flour is a powder made by grinding raw grains, roots, beans, nuts, or seeds. Flours are used to make many different foods. Cereal flour, particularly wheat flour, is the main ingredient of bread, which is a staple food for many cul ...

butter Butter is a dairy product made from the fat and protein components of churned cream. It is a semi-solid emulsion at room temperature, consisting of approximately 80% butterfat. It is used at room temperature as a spread, melted as a condim ...

, eggs,

vanilla Vanilla is a spice derived from orchids of the genus '' Vanilla'', primarily obtained from pods of the Mexican species, flat-leaved vanilla ('' V. planifolia''). Pollination is required to make the plants produce the fruit from whic ...

, and either

baking powder Baking powder is a dry chemical leavening agent, a mixture of a carbonate or bicarbonate and a weak acid. The base and acid are prevented from reacting prematurely by the inclusion of a buffer such as cornstarch. Baking powder is used to increas ...

baking soda Sodium bicarbonate (IUPAC name: sodium hydrogencarbonate), commonly known as baking soda or bicarbonate of soda, is a chemical compound with the formula NaHCO3. It is a salt composed of a sodium cation ( Na+) and a bicarbonate anion ( HCO3� ...

(depending on the type of sugar used). Sugar cookies may be formed by hand, dropped, or rolled and cut into shapes. They are commonly decorated with additional sugar, icing, sprinkles, or a combination of these. Decorative shapes and figures can be cut into the rolled-out dough using a cookie cutter. In North America, sugar cookies are popular during the holidays of Children's Day,

Christmas Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year ...

Halloween Halloween or Hallowe'en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve, or All Saints' Eve) is a celebration observed in many countries on 31 October, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Saints' Day. It begins the observan ...

, and

Hanukkah or English translation: 'Establishing' or 'Dedication' (of the Temple in Jerusalem) , nickname = , observedby = Jews , begins = 25 Kislev , ends = 2 Tevet or 3 Tevet , celebrations = Lighting candles each nig ...

History

Sugar cookies have a plain, classic flavor and have been made for centuries. The popularity and availability of sugar cookies rose when sugar became widely available. The sugar cookie is believed to have originated in the mid-1700s in Nazareth, Pennsylvania. German Protestant settlers created a round, crumbly and buttery cookie that came to be known as the Nazareth Cookie. Published recipes for the sugar cookie began to appear in the 1800s. Some of these early variations included

sour cream Sour cream (in North American English, Australian English and New Zealand English) or soured cream (British English) is a dairy product obtained by fermenting regular cream with certain kinds of lactic acid bacteria. The bacterial cultu ...

or large amounts of

milk Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfed human infants) before they are able to digest solid food. Immune factors and immune-modulat ...

, in addition or in place of the now-standard ingredients. In 1885,

The Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...

published a recipe for sugar cookies that omitted liquid dairy ingredients, included baking powder, and had a ratio of one cup of sugar to one half cup of butter. In the late 1950s, Pillsbury began selling pre-mixed refrigerated sugar cookie dough in US grocery stores, as a type of

icebox cookie An icebox (also called a cold closet) is a compact non-mechanical refrigerator which was a common early-twentieth-century kitchen appliance before the development of safely powered refrigeration devices. Before the development of electric refrig ...

. File:SugarCookie.JPG, Dropped sugar cookie File:20061001 sugar cookies.jpg, Undecorated sugar cookies, rolled out and cut into the shape of a flower File:Sugarcookie.jpg, Dropped sugar cookie with a powdered sugar glaze and

sprinkles Sprinkles are very small pieces of confectionery used as an often colourful decoration or to add texture to desserts such as brownies, cupcakes, doughnuts or ice cream. The tiny candies are produced in a variety of colors and are generally use ...

File:Christmas Cookies2.jpg, The six-pointed stars are filled with hard candy. The others are decorated with frosting. File:Buttercream Filled Sugar Cookies (25618676884).jpg, Sandwich cookies made with sugar cookies and

buttercream Buttercream, also referred to as butter icing or butter frosting, is used for either filling, coating or decorating cakes. The main ingredients are butter and some type of sugar. Buttercream is commonly flavored with vanilla. Other common fl ...

frosting

References

External links

* Cookies {{dessert-stub

History

See also

References

External links