By Jennifer Levisen

Jennifer Levisen lives and works in Albert Lea. She enjoys finding new recipes to share with her family and friends.

Typically my cravings lend themselves to more salty than sweet — hello French fries! Yes, I’m talking to you! — but lately, I’ve been dreaming about that crunchy on the outside, chewy on the inside perfection that comes in the form of a sugar cookie, with a nice dollop of not-too-sweet frosting spread on top.

Thankfully, my family is always thrilled to indulge my sweet tooth, so they whole-heartedly supported my Pinterest search for the perfect sugar cookie. I found this copycat recipe for Swig Sugar Cookies. Apparently Swig is practically an institution in Utah, known for their cookies —  specifically their sugar cookies — and their fountain drinks. Has anyone ever been? You’ll have to let me know how these compare, because if they are anywhere near as good, I might need to bump a trip to Utah up a little higher on my travel wish list! Enjoy!

Frosted Sugar Cookies

Ingredients

• 1 cup butter (room temperature)

• 3/4 cup vegetable oil

• 1 1/4 cups sugar

• 3/4 cup powdered sugar

• 2 tablespoons water

• 2 eggs

• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

• 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar

• 1 teaspoon salt

• 5 1/2 cups flour

Directions

Cream together butter, vegetable oil, sugars, water and eggs. Combine dry ingredients and slowly add to butter mixture. Mix until everything is combined. Your dough should be a little crumbly and not sticky at all.

Roll a golf ball-sized ball of dough and place it on your cookie sheet.

Apparently Swig sugar cookies have a signature rough edge, so to recreate that:

Put 1/4 cup of sugar and a pinch of salt in a dish (this is in addition to the sugar and salt listed above). Stick the bottom of a glass in it. This will serve as your cookie press. Firmly press the bottom of the glass into the center of your dough ball. You want your dough to spill out over the sides of the glass.

Bake at 350 for 8 minutes. They should just barely be browning on the bottom. (Please note it took me 13 minutes to achieve this in my oven.)

Move cookies to a cooling rack, and once they are cool store them in the refrigerator.

 

Sour Cream Frosting

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup room-temperature butter

• 3/4 cup sour cream

• 1 teaspoon salt

• Approximately one 2-pound package of powdered sugar

• 1/4 cup milk

• Food coloring

Directions

Start by creaming together butter, sour cream and salt.

Slowly add powdered sugar — you’ll use almost the entire bag. When it gets so thick, it’s not frosting-like, so add a splash of milk. Alternate this process until your frosting is the desired consistency.

Add food coloring to whatever color intensity you’d like and whip on high for one minute.

Keep cookies in a sealed container until they are ready to serve. Frost right before serving. If you make them in advance and need to refrigerate the frosting, make sure you give it time to warm up before frosting.

Cookies should be kept in the refrigerator.

 

Recipe Source: Recipe courtesy of vintagerevivals.com on Pinterest.