Name: Holiday Cutouts
Yield: Makes 7 to 8 dozen cookies
Ingredients: Ingredients for basic butter cookies; Decorating icing (optional); Food coloring in various colors (optional); Garnish: edible glitter and nonpareils (see cooks' note, below); 1 1/2- to 2-inch holiday cookie cutters*; several small heavy-duty sealable plastic bags (not pleated)

Image may contain Confectionery Food and Sweets

Holiday Cutouts

The yield for these cutouts varies depending on the size and shape of the cookie cutters you use. We chose 4- to 5-inch cutters for the cookies on the cover, which makes the yield much smaller and increases the baking time by a few minutes.

Active time: 2 hr Start to finish: 4 hr (includes decorating)

Cooks' notes:

Dough can be chilled up to 3 days.* Cookies (with or without icing) keep, layered between sheets of wax paper or parchment, in an airtight container at room temperature 1 week.* For this photograph and the cover, we thinned some icing for spreading, then covered the cookies with icing and sprinkled glitter onto the icing before it set. We also piped some decorative icing around edges and then sprinkled with nonpareils.* The FDA objects to the consumption of any metallic colors (even those labeled "edible") in confectionery products because there is no evidence to support their safe use.

Recipe notes

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