Fluffy Sugar Cookies

I love sugar cookies. It is almost always a good time to make sugar cookies, and I've had several different types of sugar cookies. I have had store-bought cookies and homemade cookies—in fact, I've had homemade cookies that make me wish I would have had cookies bought from the store.

One time my friend made a batch of some of the most amazing sugar cookies I've ever had, and I was even more surprised when I discovered the secret ingredient. My friend gave me the recipe, and now I get to share that with you. Once you make these sugar cookies, you will never want to go back to any other sugar cookie!

You will need the following ingredients:

• 1 cup (2 sticks) of softened butter
• 1-1/2 cups of sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla
• 4 cups of flour
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 1 cup of sour cream

Mixing up these sugar cookies is amazingly easy and you will also love to eat the dough! Cream the butter and the sugar together, making sure to combine it well. Go ahead and add the eggs and vanilla and mix it a little more. Add all the remaining dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, and salt) and mix it again. Then go ahead and add the sour cream. Mix it one more time.

The dough should have a firm quality and still be soft. (Be sure that you taste test it—taste testing sugar cookie dough is never a bad idea!) If the dough is too sticky, be sure to add more flour. If you do need to add more flour, make sure that you add it gradually—you don't want the dough to be too dry either!

Once the dough consistency is to your liking, put it in the fridge and let it chill for at least an hour. (You will know if it is chilled enough if it is stiff and kind of hard to manipulate.) Once the dough is sufficiently chilled, take some dough and roll is out so it is between a quarter and a half of an inch thick. Then take whatever cookie cutters you want and cut the cookies out. If you are making Halloween cookies, use pumpkin cookie cutters; if you are making St. Patrick's Day cookies, use shamrock cookie cutters; if you are making cookies for Valentine's Day, use heart-shaped cutters; you get the idea!

When you have filled up a tray of cut-out cookie dough (you should have about a dozen cookies per cookie sheet), bake them in an oven preheated to 375 degrees for nine to ten minutes. The cookies should be barely, barely, hardly even brown on the very, very bottom of the cookies. These cookies will not be good at all if they are over-baked. Don't leave the cookies out overnight uncovered, or else they will get hard and they won't be any good at all. What makes these cookies good is their soft, fluffy quality. If these sugar cookies are hard, they won't satisfy any sweet tooth at all.

These cookies are good enough to keep unfrosted, but if you want to frost them, it's best to use a powdered sugar–based frosting. Anything too heavy will make the cookies just a bit too rich for most people's tastes. These cookies are also great for shipping places. Because they are so moist, they stay delicious even when you send them across the country!

These are probably the best sugar cookies I've ever had, and now you can enjoy them too!