Great-Aunt Effie’s Sugar Cookies
Soft, cake-like texture, tasting of vanilla and nutmeg—these are the sugar cookies of my childhood. The recipe came from my great-aunt, Effie Rachel (Aurand) Vaughn (1886-1967).
She died before I was born, but her sugar cookies were a family favorite. I still have her original hand-written recipe. 😊
Although her recipe says to roll out the dough—to cut into shapes—I don’t remember ever doing that. The dough was too soft and sticky. Instead, we dropped it by spoonfuls onto the cookie sheet.
However, when I made the recipe this time, I was shocked—it was very crumbly. I had to add a bit more milk to get it to stick together! This isn’t at all how I remember the dough. (And I last made the cookies only a couple years ago.)
- Maybe I put too much flour in, since I just eyeballed the measurements.
- Maybe I have a slightly different version on another recipe card.
- Maybe using real butter (which I used this time) instead of margarine (which I typically use) makes a difference.
Who knows? But it gave me an opportunity to actually roll out the dough and cut it into shapes! 😊
Great-Aunt Effie’s Sugar Cookies
Ingredients
- 3 cups flour
- 1 cup sugar
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 scant tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp nutmeg
- 1 cup butter or margarine
- 2 large eggs
- 4 tbl milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Directions
- Preheat oven to 375°F / 190°C. Lightly grease a cookie sheet.
- Stir together dry ingredients. Cut in butter until it forms a crumbly mix.
- In a separate bowl, beat the eggs, milk, and vanilla. Pour into the dry ingredients and mix well.
- Roll out dough on floured surface and cut into shapes. Or drop by spoonfuls onto greased cookie sheet.
- Bake at 375°F / 190°C until lightly browned on bottoms or edges; about 8-10 minutes. Makes about 3-5 dozen cookies, depending on size.
Notes
