[Kitsa]

MOTHMAN COOKIE DOUGH

2/3 Cups Butter (REAL butter)- this is one stick plus 3 tablespoons, just hack it into pieces and use it straight out of the fridge, don't soften it
3/4 Cup Granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 egg (REAL egg, not egg beaters)
4 teaspoons milk
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Cream together butter, sugar and vanilla. Add egg and beat till fluffy. Stir in milk one teaspoon at a time. Sift together the dry ingredients in a separate bowl, give it a few stirs to combine, and dump it into the creamed mixture. Mix very MINIMALLY, just until everything is integrated. Chill the dough in the fridge for an hour. The longer past an hour, the harder it is to work with.

When you have about 15 mins left on the hour, preheat your oven to 375. Get out a sheet of parchment and dust it with flour. You'll also need a rolling pin and whatever cutters you plan to use. At the end of the hour chill, pull the dough back out, scrape it out of the bowl, form it into sort of a ball thing and roll it out to 1/8". You might need to put another piece of parchment on top. (For some reason, this works best with parchment, not silpat or wax paper.)

When it's flat, peel off the top parchment and do your cutting. Transfer to a parchment-lined cookie sheet. Again, can't stress enough the importance of the parchment, it makes this a hell of a lot easier.

Bake at 375 for about 6 to 8 minutes, or as many as 10 if they're big cookies. Watch them like a freakin' hawk. When you start to smell the vanilla and when they are just BARELY beginning to turn the slightest golden brown on the edges, they're done. I take the cookie sheet, give the parchment a tug and lay the parchment and cookies right on a flat countertop to let them cool. This makes about 2 dozen cookies, depending on size, and translates well to christmas cookies or hamantaschen or jam thumbprints or pretty much anything. The icing shown above will keep them crazy soft.