Easy Sugar Cookies That Hold Their Shape (and a Rolling Pin Giveaway)!

This is a really simple recipe for you to try and a great giveaway too.
Have you ever tried to make cookies that don’t lose their shape when baked?
This recipe ensures that whatever shape cookie you bake, they come out of the oven looking like whatever you intended them to in the first place. None of this spreading into indistinguishable blobs!

This recipe is for a plain cookie, which Americans refer to as a sugar cookie, comprises just butter, sugar, one egg, a touch of vanilla and plain flour. In the right proportions, it is the perfect dough for keeping its shape.
It doesn't contain baking powder or soda, which can make a cookie puff up. These are chilled before baking also, another important factor in keeping their shape.
Which is ideal for a Valek engraved rolling pin. These wooden pins, laser etched from Polish beech wood, are engraved with loads of designs to choose from.
I have the spiral pin which gives a lovely effect on some chilled dough as you can see.

These rolling pins are so beautiful even without using them for baking. They are also ideal for kids to use with play dough, or potters using to emboss clay.

But for us bakers they can give lovely effects on dough.

They come in an assortment of designs, take a look at their website to see just how many you can choose from. And I mean that - you can choose! I am delighted to bring you a giveaway for one Valek rolling pin with one of the designs from the website. 

The pins are available from the website for around £16 to £25.

See below for the perfect recipe for cookie dough to use with these pins and details on how to enter the giveaway!
print recipe

Sugar Cookiesby S Vettese July-25-2016Basic sugar cookies which keep their shapeIngredients

• 200 grams butter, softened
• 200 grams caster sugar
• 1 medium egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 400 grams plain flour

InstructionsPreheat the oven to 180C (160C fan) and line two baking sheets with greaseproof paper.In a mixer, beat together the butter and sugar until just combined.Add the egg and vanilla and beat until just combined.Add the flour and incorporate until a dough forms.Break the dough into two halves, wrap in clingfilm and chill for two hours.After the two hours, roll out to about a quarter of an inch thick. Finish by rolling with the Valek pin to emboss the design on your dough.Cut out with cookie cutters of your choice.Place onto the baking sheets and bake for 10 to 12 minutes until golden around the edges.Cool before enjoying!DetailsPrep time: 20 mins Cook time: 15 mins Total time: 35 mins Yield: 24 cookies
I added a brush of melted chocolate to the bottom of mines by tracing out the cookie cutter on some greaseproof paper.
I flipped the paper over and painted some melted chocolate to the traced shape. I pressed the cooled cookie into it and let firm up.
This part is optional.
These cookies are my entry to this month’s Treat Petite hosted by Kat at The Baking Explorer. The theme is anything goes!

To be in with a chance of winning a Valek rolling pin, a design of your choice, simply enter via the Rafflecopter thingamajig below.
The giveaway ends the midnight on the 15 August. Open to UK residents only good luck!
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Disclosure Statement: I received the rolling pin free to try. I have not been paid to run this giveaway any opinions expressed are my own.