Halloween is here, whoohoo! Love the holiday, love the dressing up and trick or treating and loooove the food and sweets. 🙂 One of the great things about Halloween is you get to bake scary cookies and decorate them with colorful icing.

I am still practicing my decorating skills and always looking for new recipes for cookies and icings. This recipe is so easy, the butter cookies turn out so soft and buttery and royal icing shiny and so easy to make and decorate with.

Full recipe with clear step by step instructions and images is below. Enjoy baking and decorating and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

If you cooked and liked this recipe, please leave a comment and give it a rating. It is really important for us to know your opinion 🙂 Thank you!

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Halloween Butter Cookies with Royal Icing

Soft and deliciously scary, these butter cookies with royal icing are easy to make and are so cute.

Prep Time10

Cook Time10

Chilling and cutting time:1 20

Total Time1 40

Course: Dessert, Snack

Cuisine: American, International

Keyword: Butter Cookies, Cookies, Halloween, Royal Icing

Servings: 30

Calories: 150kcal

Author: ChiefElf

Equipment

Hand or Stand Mixer
Flat baking sheet
Mixing bowls
Small plastic bags or icing bags

Ingredients

For the butter cookie dough:

2 cups (240 grams) all-purpose flour
½ teaspoons (3 grams) salt
1 cup (230 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature
½ cup (100 grams) sugar
2 egg yolks
2 teaspoons (5 ml) vanilla extract

For the royal icing:

4 egg whites
4 cups (450 grams) confectioners sugar (sifted)
1 teaspoon lemon extract

Instructions

Prepare the cookie dough:

In a stand mixer or with your hand mixer, fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the softened butter, salt and sugar until light and fluffy and creamy.
Add the egg yolks while mixing. Add the vanilla extract.
Add the flour and mix until well incorporated.
Form the dough into a ball, wrap in plastic food wrap and put it in the fridge for at least an hour to cool.
Tip: You can also roll the dough into a flat circle, place it onto parchment paper and place it into the fridge like that, then you just have to cut out shapes and place in the oven. Or roll the dough into a log shape and after it chilled, cut it into circles, like bread.
Preheat the oven to 180°C (350 °F). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
After the dough has chilled, take it our and roll it our into a circle about 0.5-1 cm in thickness. Use cookie cutter to cut out shapes and place on a prepared baking sheet.
Bake the cookies in a preheated oven for 10-12 minutes, depending on the thickness. Cookies are ready when they are just beginning to get a golden tint.
Allow the cookies to chill on the baking sheet for about 10 minute, before transferring to a wire rack to cool down completely.

Prepare the Royal Icing:

While the cookies are cooling down you can prepare the icing. It is really easy.
In a large bowl beat the egg whites with an electric mixer until foamy.
Gradually add the confectioners sugar and lemon extract.
Beat on high speed until thickened and glossy.
Separate the icing and add different food colorings to the make the colors that you want. Place the icings into plastic bags, tie off the ends and set aside until cookies have cooled down enough. I made black, orange, green, yellow and white colors.
Once the cookies are cooled to room temperature and icing is ready, begin decorating the cookies with the royal icing. Make sure that out cut a really small hole in the icing bags, to have a thin line.
Allow the icing to set before placing the cookies on a plate.
Enjoy!

Nutritional Facts:

Calories: 150 kcal, Total Fat: 6.5 grams, Saturated Fat: 4 grams, Cholesterol: 30 mg, Sodium: 88 mg, Total Carbohydrates: 21.1 grams, Dietary Fiber: 0.2 grams, Total Sugars: 3.5 grams, Protein: 1.6 grams, Vitamin D: 5 mcg, Calcium: 5 mg, Iron: 0 mg, Potassium: 20 mg

Servings: 30