When it comes to making Valentine's Day treats, sugar cookies are always a winner.
One of our family's favorite methods for decorating sugar cookies is to leave behind the thick buttercream frosting and make fresh fruit pizzas. This is great fun because everyone can be involved and the results are colorful and delicious. Older children, with a little supervision, can bake the cookies and cut up the fruit and even young toddlers can put fruit on the cookies and participate in gifting and taste testing.
Fruit pizzas are fun in sizes from 1-ounce bite-sized (or kid-sized) to 3-ounce boyfriend-pleasers. You can even press the dough out onto a pizza plate or skillet and bake a large fruit pizza for the whole family. When you change the sizes, leave the oven temperature at 325 degrees but adjust the time. Larger sizes will brown more evenly if they are turned partway through the baking time.
When it comes to decorating, get creative! Choose fruits in many different textures and colors and chop them up in a variety of shapes. Ice your pizzas with a little whipping cream, then set a heart or flower cookie cutter in the center and let small children layer fruit inside of the cutter to make strawberry hearts or flowers with blueberry petals and mandarin oranges in the center. The sky is the limit and the result is always tasty!
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Fruit Pizza Cookies
1 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups sifted flour
teaspoon baking soda
teaspoon cream of tartar
teaspoon salt
Cream together butter, sugar, egg and vanilla until light and fluffy. In a separate bowl, combine dry ingredients and stir together. Add dry ingredients to creamed mixture and beat well. Shape into 1-ounce dough balls (using a 1-ounce disher makes this simpler) and bake at 325 degrees for 10 minutes until light brown around the edges.
Cool completely before icing with whipping cream and fresh fruit.
Larayne Jensen
One of our family's favorite methods for decorating sugar cookies is to leave behind the thick buttercream frosting and make fresh fruit pizzas. This is great fun because everyone can be involved and the results are colorful and delicious. Older children, with a little supervision, can bake the cookies and cut up the fruit and even young toddlers can put fruit on the cookies and participate in gifting and taste testing.
Fruit pizzas are fun in sizes from 1-ounce bite-sized (or kid-sized) to 3-ounce boyfriend-pleasers. You can even press the dough out onto a pizza plate or skillet and bake a large fruit pizza for the whole family. When you change the sizes, leave the oven temperature at 325 degrees but adjust the time. Larger sizes will brown more evenly if they are turned partway through the baking time.
When it comes to decorating, get creative! Choose fruits in many different textures and colors and chop them up in a variety of shapes. Ice your pizzas with a little whipping cream, then set a heart or flower cookie cutter in the center and let small children layer fruit inside of the cutter to make strawberry hearts or flowers with blueberry petals and mandarin oranges in the center. The sky is the limit and the result is always tasty!
******
Fruit Pizza Cookies
1 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups sifted flour
teaspoon baking soda
teaspoon cream of tartar
teaspoon salt
Cream together butter, sugar, egg and vanilla until light and fluffy. In a separate bowl, combine dry ingredients and stir together. Add dry ingredients to creamed mixture and beat well. Shape into 1-ounce dough balls (using a 1-ounce disher makes this simpler) and bake at 325 degrees for 10 minutes until light brown around the edges.
Cool completely before icing with whipping cream and fresh fruit.
Larayne Jensen
