Sables Butter Cookies

Tricia McAlister: Athens, GA

Every Christmas, my mother would prepare this cookie dough for my five sisters and I to decorate. It was always a day to look forward to—she would spread out the dough on the kitchen table, we would listen to Christmas music, and we’d get to choose various Christmas shapes and all kinds of colored sugar to decorate the cookies. My mother has been gone for 35 years, but my sisters still carry on the tradition of making these cookies every year for our family and friends. A couple of years ago, I gifted my sisters with a cookie plate with my mother’s handwritten recipe. While we may have to “interpret” my mother’s handwriting, the memories it invokes are priceless. My sisters display this plate in their kitchens today. The picture is of the plate and the cookies—they may be simple, but they are made with love! The printed recipe is from our neighborhood’s cookbook from 1978.

Ingredients:

2/3 cup salted butter, softened
2 1/4 cup sifted all-purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/4 tsp baking powder
1 whole large egg
1 large egg, separated
1 tbsp water
1/8 tsp salt
1/4 tsp vanilla

Instructions:

Cream butter and sugar in a bowl until fluffy. Then add the whole egg, egg yolk, and vanilla to butter mixture and beat thoroughly.
In a separate bowl, sift flour, baking powder, and salt.
Add the egg/butter mixture and mix well; chill dough for at least two hours.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Divide dough into two portions and roll one portion at a time.
Roll out dough into desired shapes and place cookies on ungreased cookie sheets.
Beat together remaining egg white and water. Brush over cookies and top with colored sugar.
Bake 8 to 10 minutes.