Ultimate Sugar Cookies

9-ingredient magic are these soft and buttery sugar cookies. They are everything you wish those grocery store sugar cookies taste like, but none of the disappointment. Vanilla undertones perfume each bite while their soft and fluffy texture brings them to the border of cake territory.

What I love most about these cookies, however, is their infinite adaptability. While they are the bomb-dot-com as-is, even the simplest variations will level up these bad boys like Charmander evolving into Charizard. Sugary coatings like sprinkles provide a welcomed crunchy contrast, while spices like cinnamon, or flavorings like citrus juice or almond extract build complexity of flavor.

If you’re making these for the first time, I recommend limiting alterations to the exterior of the cookies. Then after you’ve gotten the hang of things, let your imagination run wild for future batches. I’m drooling over the idea of a lavender lemon variation!

These cookies are my favorite alongside a hot cup of coffee in the afternoon. However, they’re also great to serve at parties for picky eaters or to present as an impressive contribution to a dinner at a friend’s house—it’s like three desserts in one! Whatever the occasion, be sure to keep some for your personal stash to enjoy ALONE!

The Recipe

Makes 24-28 cookies

This recipe has been modified from King Arthur Flour; ingredients and language were slightly adapted.

Ingredients

Cookie

3 cups (375 grams) all-purpose flour (🔥 Flour Police)

1 teaspoon baking powder

¼ teaspoon baking soda

¾ teaspoon fine sea or table salt

1 cup (225 grams) unsalted butter (🔥Soft Start)

¼ cup (55 grams) cream cheese (🔥Soft Start & 🎩Fluffy Cookies)

1 ¼ cups (250 grams) granulated sugar

1 large egg

2 teaspoons vanilla extract (🎩Plain Vanilla)

Classic Coating

⅓ cup granulated sugar

Alternative Coatings (🎩They See Me Rollin’)

1 cup sprinkles

¼ cup granulated sugar + 2 tbs ground cinnamon

Instructions

Make the dough:

1. Dump the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium sized bowl. Then, mix these dry ingredients to combine. No need to sift or do anything fancy here.

2. (🔥To Make a Double Batch) In a large bowl or the bowl of your stand mixer, beat the softened cream cheese, if using (🎩Fluffy Cookies), and butter with the granulated sugar until fluffy. We’re looking for things to become uniformly combined. You’ll know it’s ready when there are no visible, distinct pockets or streaks of butter. If you’re mixing with a stand mixer, be sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula to ensure everything is fully incorporated (🔥Manual Mode).

3. Add the egg and vanilla to the butter mixture and beat again until fully incorporated.

4. Pour roughly half of the dry ingredients into the butter mixture and mix until about 75% of the flour is incorporated. You’ll still see pockets and streaks of dry flour in the dough — that’s good.

5. Add the remaining half of the flour mixture. This time, stir the dough by hand with a rubber spatula, making sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl. Stir until the moment the dry flour has just disappeared into the dough. If there are a few faint dry streaks, stir 1-2 more times then reassess (🔥Sir Don’t Mix A Lot).

6. If you have the patience and time, let the dough rest unrefrigerated for 20-60 minutes. This will allow the flour to fully hydrate, maximizing those buttery vanilla flavors.

Prepare the coating(s):

1. Pour the ¼ cup of granulated sugar into a small bowl; if you are using multiple coatings, pour each coating in its own separate small bowl.

Coat the dough:

1. Portion the cookies into ~1 ½ tbs clumps (🔥The Scoop on Scoops). Roll each clump gently in your hands to form a smooth ball. Then lightly drop the dough balls into the coatings, turning gently to cover the entire sphere (🎩They See Me Rollin’). Coat as many of the dough balls as you desire.

Bake the cookies:

1. Preheat the oven to 365°F. Line two sheet pans with parchment paper. Don’t use a silpat for these cookies.

2. Transfer the coated dough balls to the baking sheets, spacing them two inches apart. Gently press the cookies with your fingertips until they are ~½-inch tall (🎩Crispy/Soft). Bake one sheet at a time for 9-10 minutes each. They’ll look slightly under-baked when they’re ready, but that’s ok. If there’s a kiss of golden brown where the cookies meet the pan, remove them from the oven immediately!

3. Cool the cookies for 3-5 minutes on the baking sheet then transfer to cooling racks to cool them completely.

Enjoy!

Hot Tips 🔥

• FLOUR POLICE — You need to properly measure the flour for this recipe. Too much flour will make these cookies dry, dense, and taste floury. For the best ways to measure flour, check out a tutorial here.

• SOFT START — Start with softened butter and cream cheese otherwise you’ll end up with pockets of butter that will leave holes in your finished cookies. In a rush? Cut the butter into 2 tbs pats, then space them evenly on a microwavable plate. Microwave in four second intervals, checking the texture of the butter after each interval. You’re looking for the butter to take an imprint of your finger when pressed, but not be melted.

• TO MAKE A DOUBLE BATCH — This recipe scales well but I would suggest mixing the ingredients in a large WIDE bowl, Narrow bottomed bowls like the ones for stand mixers are hard to mix at the bottom, resulting in over-mixing.

• MANUAL MODE — This recipe is best made using an electric mixer. If you’re making this by hand, beat the butter, cream cheese, and sugar together as best you can, ensuring a homogenous mixture. This might take 5 minutes but it’s important that the butter and sugar are thoroughly combined.

• SIR DON’T MIX A LOT— Over-mixing will give you tough cookies. To prevent over-mixing, stop mixing the moment you stop seeing dry flour in the dough.

• THE SCOOP ON SCOOPS — Ice cream scoopers ensure uniform sized cookies and an even bake. For this recipe I like to use a #40 (1 1/2 tbs) scoop. If you don’t have an ice cream scoop don’t sweat it. Just portion the dough out in golf ball sized spheres.

Tricks 🎩

• FLUFFY COOKIES — Omitting the cream cheese will produce a true butter cookie that is flatter as a result.

• PLAIN VANILLA — If you are lucky enough to have vanilla extracts from different companies, try using a combination of the vanillas, totaling 2 tsps. Vanilla is extracted at varying temperatures depending on the company so no two extracts are the same. Using multiple extracts builds complexity in vanilla flavor. Alternatively, instead of vanilla use either 1/4 tsp of almond extract or 2 tsp citrus juice plus zest for a brighter flavor.

• THEY SEE ME ROLLIN’ — Granulated sugar, sanding sugar, turbinado sugar, confetti sprinkles, rainbow or chocolate jimmies, cinnamon sugar, pumpkin pie spice. They are all great choices for coating these cookies. Although I haven’t yet tried finely chopped nuts, I expect they would be great too. Or, skip the coating and top these with buttercream frosting.

• CRISPY/SOFT — The more you flatten the spheres before baking, the crispier they will be when baked. However, don’t flatten to less than 1/4 inch tall! Conversely, if you like your cookies a little underdone in the center, don’t flatten at all!