Christmas Sugar Cookies

This year's Christmas sugar cookies were game-changers.  For the past two years, Ava and Sidney have been making and decorating Christmas cookies that Sidney could not eat because they contained dairy and eggs.  This year I found a dairy, egg and nut free recipe that will put your sugar cookie recipe to SHAME!  (or maybe not, but these cookies are seriously amazing and I'm so happy that Sidney could enjoy them with us finally).

I adapted the recipe below from the Speed Bump Kitchen blog.  Here's my version:

Ingredients:
½ cup Earth Balance Vegan Buttery Sticks (or shortening, margarine, or coconut oil)
⅔ cup sugar
¼ cup dairy-free milk (I use Silk Soy Milk) + 1T cider vinegar
2 cups flour
½ t. baking soda
¼ t. salt
1T. vanilla (optional but I used it)
a pinch of cinnamon (optional but I used it)
Cookie decorating icing and sprinkles

Instructions:
1.  In a large bowl, cream the sugar and butter together until smooth.
2.  Combine the milk and vinegar together and then add to the sugar mixture.  Beat until smooth again.
3.  Add the vanilla and cinnamon and mix well.  The dough is going to look gross - like scrambled eggs - but don't worry.  Once you add the dry ingredients it will look normal.
4.  In a separate bowl sift together the flour, baking soda and salt and slowly add to the sugar mixture.
5.  Wrap in plastic wrap, shape into a big disk and freeze for ½ hour.
6.  Roll to ¼ inch thickness and cut out as you like.
7.  Bake on a parchment-lined baking sheets at 350 degrees for 8 minutes for soft cookies (they may seem barely baked, but they’ll firm up when cooled). 
8.  Cool completely on a cookie sheet before icing.  I just transferred the whole sheet of parchment paper with cookies on top to a cookie sheet to cool.

We used Betty Crocker Cookie Icing to decorate the sugar cookies.  We also used holiday sprinkles, dairy-free chocolate chips and sugar crystals.  Here are some pics of the girls' cookies!

I have a general policy against eating food made by kids, even my own, so I can't speak for how their cookies taste.  But mine are fantastic!  I am single-handedly eating them all by myself!  I just used sugar crystals. You sprinkle them on before you bake the cookies - so easy!

Merry Christmas from me in my PJ's!