Prettiest sugar cookies, made easy

There are rigorous guidelines for cookies appropriate for tea parties. They should be dainty, so you can eat them without looking unladylike. They should be decorative, because they are going to be displayed and oohed and aahhed over. Also, they should be relatively easy to make, because you probably have a million other things to do, including somehow making yourself look ladylike enough to attend said tea party.

Bam.

{tea cookies}

A sugar cookie recipe that I love (not overly sweet) + the genius linzer cookie cutter which makes this relatively foolproof + boysenberry jam.

How to make cookies without spending 3 straight hours in the kitchen  - aka obsessive time management for people who work full time and don't love being stuck in the kitchen till 1 am

Wednesday: Make dough, wrap in saran, leave in fridge.

Thursday: Remove dough from fridge, let it soften up while you eat dinner. Roll it out and cut cookies, placing them on a baking sheet as you go. Stick baking sheet in freezer for about an hour. Once frozen, transfer cookies to a Ziploc bag. Put them in the freezer again (you can actually do this up to a month ahead of time, if you make sure you push all the air out of the bag and seal it tightly).

Friday: Bake cookies (side advantage to the freezer method is that you get beautiful, crisp shapes instead of blobs) and let them cool.

Saturday: Sandwich cookies together with a bit of jam in the middle, eat.

The cookies in the back are Deb's brownie roll-out cookies, sandwiched with a bit of ganache in the middle. Tasty, even for a non chocolate lover.