Sugar Cookie Recipes

Mix colored sugars (or use leftover sugar from your work surface) to create new shades for these holiday treats.

These "trees" are made from stacks of sugar cookies coated with white icing. See our Royal Icing recipe.

These oversize sugar cookies don't need any mix-ins or frostings -- their bold chocolate flavor says it all.

'Tis the season to trim the tree--the sugar-cookie tree that is! Strands of melted white chocolate and a smattering of red candies mimic the appearance of Christmas lights, and a cookie star illuminates the top of each tree.

The basis for this recipe is the simple sugar cookie, enhanced with almonds and a hint of lemon. Once they are baked, the cookies resemble a sand dollar.

A rosy riff on the classic New York black-and-white cookies, these beauties get their blush from ruby-red-grapefruit juice and a couple of drops of food coloring. Rather than the usual vanilla flavor, we zested a grapefruit to infuse both the cookies and pink icing with zing. 

This gingerbread creche is the flavorful foundation for cookie decorator Dani Fiori's edible Nativity scene. Also try: Donkey Sugar Cookie, Sheep Sugar Cookie

These cookies are also delicious without mix-ins: After chilling and slicing the cookies, brush the tops with a lightly beaten egg white, and sprinkle with sanding sugar.

These petite fall treats will charm all but the grumpiest ghouls. Simple sugar cookies are garnished with candy corn pieces for a sweet fall treat.

These easy drop cookies are a cinch to make but have a taste that's truly next level. After the dough gets mixed with a generous amount of cinnamon and vanilla, it's portioned out onto baking sheets and topped with a double coating of fine sanding sugar to create a crisp, crackly top once baked. 

We mixed plant-based food dyes (yellow from turmeric and red from beets) into buttercream to top these painterly sugar cookies.

Debra Satterthwaite of Carmel, Indiana, put a twist on a classic sugar-cookie recipe with the addition of lemon zest, ginger, and fresh mint.

Let kids play Jackson Pollock by squeezing drops of liquid food coloring onto large squares of dough and then using a straw to blow the color around. Layer colors until the abstract "painting" is complete.

Dried pineapple gives these cookies their tropical flavor.

Use aspic cutters, essentially tiny cookie cutters, to create doily patterns.

In this delicious recipe, old-fashioned sugar cookies are enlivened with the flavors of citrus oils and zests. Chewy on the inside and crispy on the outside, these treats are glazed with sanding sugar for an irresistible crackly sugar topping.

We paired animal cookies two by two for an edible menagerie in these aptly named Noah's Ark Sugar Cookies.

These feline-shaped treats are inspired by the 1973 short film "How to Draw a Cat".

These lemony sugar cookies won't last long.

Simple sugar cookies serve as the canvas for these elegant "cherry blossoms." Use pink royal icing to create the "petals" and brown luster dust to form the "branches."

This recipe makes a lot of cookies, but it can be halved, or you can freeze a portion of the dough for up to three weeks.

Sugar-cookie "rabbits" and "carrots" are frosted with royal icing and painted with a bright mixture of luster dust and water for these festive treats. Hand the kids a paintbrush and let them help decorate—it's the ultimate Easter activity!

Mary had a little lamb whose icing was as white as snow (or pink, if you prefer) thanks to a sprinkling of sanding sugar.

Ginger-laced, heart-shaped sugar cookies offer a sweetly spicy crunch.