How to make sugar cookies

Narellan Vale’s Lilly Kerr shares her recipe for making sugar cookies. Find out how to make the sweet and delicious treats here:

Lilly Kerr’s sugar cookies are popular with her family and friends.

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SUGAR COOKIES

Ingredients: 340g of softened unsalted butter, 1 cup of caster sugar, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste, ½ teaspoon salt, ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon, 2 eggs at room temperature, 1 cup biscuit, cake and pastry flour, 2 cups plain flour

Method: Preheat oven to 190C. Line baking trays with baking paper.

Place softened butter and caster sugarsugar in a mixing bowl. Mix ingredients until combined and light and fluffy. I generally use the dough hook on my electric mixer.

Add baking powder, salt, vanilla bean and ground cinnamon. Mix until well combined.

Add eggs and mix until just combined.

Add remaining dry ingredients to wet mixture and mix until well combined, remembering to scrape down sides of bowl occasionally to ensure all is mixed well.

Wrap dough tightly with plastic wrap and chill for half an hour.

Lightly flour bench top and roll out dough. Using a cutter cut to desired shape.

Place shapes onto baking tray and chill in fridge.

Bake for 10-15 minutes or until the edges are golden brown.

Remove from oven and place on an airing rack to cool. Decorate the cooled cookies with your favourite icing.

WHEN Lilly Kerr dragged her boyfriend Nick to the Cake, Bakes and Sweets Show at Sydney Olympic Park in June, little did she know the trip would change her life.

“When we arrived the first thing we saw was the sugar cookie demonstration and from that moment on I was in heaven,’’ the Narellan Vale resident said.

“I bought a few things to try out and took some great ideas from the show.

“I went home that night and made about 50 cookies just for the fun of it. That was the moment I decided this is what I wanted to do with my time from now on.’’

Lilly, 20, started her Facebook page Lill’s Cookie Creations and began baking cookies in a range of designs and sharing them.

“The more I posted on Facebook, the faster my followers grew and more orders started to flow in,’’ she said.

She got her mum Vanetta to help her in the kitchen.

“Now she is my partner in cookie crime and we love spending most nights in the kitchen making these beautiful cookies together,’’ Lilly said.

She recommends people follow their gut feeling to make the perfect sugar cookie.

“If you feel like the dough is too sticky, add a bit more flour,’’ she said.

“Just follow your basic baking instinct is my best advice.’’

Lilly, an administration officer, said sugar cookies were perfect to take along to family events and for gifts.

“It brings me so much joy seeing my family and friends enjoying my baking. There is no greater feeling to me,’’ she said.