Heart Sugar Cookies With Marbled Icing

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Surprise your loved ones with these gorgeous (and easy!) Valentine Sugar Cookies WIth Marbled Icing. Forget about the fancy piping and decorations, these cookies get dipped in swirled icing for a beautiful marbled effect. Another bonus is that the cookie dough doesn’t need to be chilled before rolling it out!

I’m planning to go elegant this V-day with a menu that includes Prosciutto, Pear, And Blue Cheese Appetizers, Scallops Bruno, and Oven Asparagus Risotto.

Sugar Cookies

Why do we find making sugar cookies so elusive? We want a recipe that tastes delicious; isn’t too hard or too soft; doesn’t spread and lose its shape when baked; and is easy to roll out. Is that too much to ask?

No! This recipe has been my ‘go-to’ sugar cookie recipe for years. It makes cookies that are perfectly soft, yet not so soft that they can’t hold a lot of icing. The dough comes together easily and doesn’t need to be chilled, which if you’re impatient like me, is a huge bonus. Also, it produces cookies with sharp edge lines for the prettiest shapes ever.

Ingredients Needed

• Butter – there isn’t a good substitution for this one. You need the butter for the best flavor, texture, and crumb.
• Granulated sugar and powdered sugar
• Vanilla extract and almond extract
• All-purpose flour and baking powder
• Eggs
• Cream – either half-and-half or heavy cream will work
• Gel food coloring – gel offers the most intense color without affecting the consistency of the icing.

Steps To Make This Recipe

1. Make the cookie dough by first creaming together the butter and sugar, then adding the eggs and extracts.
2. Stir in the flour and baking powder until a dough forms.
3. Roll out the dough on a powder sugar-dusted surface and cut out the hearts.
4. Bake until the edges begin to brown.
5. Allow the cookies to cool completely.
6. Make the icing by mixing the powdered sugar and cream together until smooth. Add the white icing to the large bowl.
7. Spoon a small amount into three small bowls and add enough gel color to make one red and one pink.
8. Swirl both the red and the pink into the large bowl of white icing.
9. Dip one side of each cookie into the icing and let dry on a wire rack.

Tips And Tricks

• Use butter. If you use unsalted butter, add ⅛ teaspoon of salt to the dough. Omit the salt if you’re using salted butter. Allow the butter to come to room temperature before mixing to make the process easier.
• Don’t worry if the dough looks too crumbly. Keep mixing it or turn it out onto a floured surface and knead it a few times until the dough resembles Play-Dough.
• Using powdered sugar to roll out the dough adds a lovely sweetness to the outside of the cookie and a bit of crispness. It also allows you to reroll the scraps without making the cookie tough. This cookie dough is more forgiving than the usual sugar cookie dough in that you can roll the dough out in flour and reroll the scraps one time without compromising the texture. Rolling the dough out in powdered sugar will allow you to reroll the scraps more than once.
• Don’t overbake the cookies. Keep in mind that they will continue to bake on the baking sheet while the set. You want just a slight hint of color around the very edge of the cookies and a hint of gold on the bottom.
• For the icing, consistency is key. The consistency should be like glue. If you pour some of the icing on top of the icing already in the bowl and it takes a second or two before it sinks into the bowl and flattens out, this is a perfect consistency.
• Drizzle the colored icing very lightly. You can always add more but really can’t take it out.
• Don’t swirl too much. Use a light hand for the best-looking marbled effect.
• Use a toothpick to pop any bubbles that appear in the icing on the cookie after you lay it on the wire rack to dry.
• The colors will begin to ‘fade’ as you keep dipping the cookies. Lightly drizzle and swirl additional colors as needed.
• Allow the cookies to dry for at least 12 hours or up to 24 hours before storing them in an airtight container, packed in between layers of wax paper.

A Few More Valentine’s Sweets To Consider:

• Healthy Strawberry Granita
• Mini Cherry Cheesecakes
• Soft Red Velvet Cookies With Cream Cheese Frosting
• Red Velvet Cupcakes
• Mousse Au Chocolat
• Italian Amaretti Peaches
• Incredible Molten Lava Cakes

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