It’s that time of year again! Time to start thinking about what kind of goodies will adorn your holiday table. I find it hard to narrow down the number of recipes I use, and some years it ends up being 15 or 20 different types of cookies, candies, and snacks. Each year the variety changes, but there are always a few favorites that the family insists on. Sugar cookies is one of those that is a “must have” every year. It’s also a great recipe to have on hand because by changing the cookie cutters, you can use this recipe year round.
Yields approx. 30 cookies
Ingredients:
- 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 1/2 tsp almond extract (optional, but good)
- 2 tsp gluten-free vanilla extract
- 1 large egg
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1 1/3 cup white rice flour
- 2/3 cup tapioca starch
- 2/3 cup potato starch (not flour)
- 1 1/2 tsp xanthan gum
Directions:
- In the bowl of a stand mixer on medium speed, beat the softened butter and sugar until fully incorporated. Reduce the speed to low and add the extracts and the egg. Mix just until blended.
- In a separate mixing bowl, whisk together the salt, baking powder, rice flour, tapioca starch, potato starch, and xanthan gum.
- With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the dry ingredients, scraping down the bowl as necessary. Mix just until the dough comes together.
- Scrape the dough out onto a sheet of plastic wrap, and wrap tightly before refrigerating for at least 1 hour. This will help your butter to solidify and help your cookies to keep their shape while baking.
- When you are ready to bake, preheat your oven to 350 degrees F and line your baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Working with a quarter of the dough at a time, roll the dough to about 3/8-inch thick between two sheets of plastic wrap, dusting with a small amount of sweet rice flour if necessary. Cut to desired shapes and place on prepared baking sheets, leaving 2-inches between cookies. You can re-roll the scraps until all the dough has been used.
- Bake in preheated oven for 8-12 minutes, depending on the size of your cookies. The cookies should just barely be turning brown around the edges, and have just a light brown colour on the bottom of the cookie.
- Let cookies sit on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before removing to a cooling rack. Allow cookies to cool completely before decorating with icing or storing in an air-tight container.
Note: This is the Royal Icing recipe I used. It comes from www.sweetopia.net.
Also perfect for your special Valentine.
Spring/Easter Cookies are so cute too!
For great tips on decorating your Gluten-Free Sugar Cookies, be sure to visit Sweetopia.net. Marian has a lot of really great recipes, tutorials, and videos to walk you through your cookie decorating. I had the pleasure of meeting Marian at Canada’s Baking & Sweets Show in September. She is AMAZING at what she does!
I’m so happy to have found your site. I’m new to the Gluten-free world and anxious to find recipes and ideas to help me eat gluten-free. These cookies look so pretty and I can’t wait to make them.
Welcome here, Joanie!
I love all your recipes ! I baked your sour cream cookies last night and hubby loves them! I relaxed the vanilla with lemon extract and also halved brown rice flour with half sweet rice flour ….sprinkled with raw sugar instead of iced and they were crunchy on outside and soft inside! The lemon flavor was outstanding this morning as the last of the cookies walked out Inside his lunch pail! Lol
Awesome, Genee!! All those changes, and the last of the cookies still disappeared by morning.
Nice!! Love it when I hear how others have changed the recipe!
Hi Jeanine!
It was such a pleasure meeting you this past fall! I can’t wait to try your recipe out and your cookies turned out so cute – love them!
Thank you so much, Marian! I know I will make time before Christmas to do this again, it was a lot of fun. Even bought myself a new cutter to try out.
What could be used for the white rice flour? I understand there are is not many good nutrients in white rice.
You could sub (all or part) with brown rice flour, however the texture & flavour of the cookie will probably be altered. It’s like using white flour or whole wheat flour – in cookies, one usually uses white flour, and saves the whole wheat for their breads.
Hi!
I love your blog. I was just wondering how many cookies this recipe makes?
Thanks
Yields approx. 30 cookies (but that will depend on how thick you roll your dough, and how big your cookie cutters are)
Finally got around to making these today, they are amazing!! My kids devoured the ones I let them eat. Can’t wait to frost them tomorrow. Thanks so much for another great recipe!
Oh Jeanine…you have done it again! Hit it right out of the ballpark! These are amazing! I admit to substituting almond extract for the vanilla thinking I had to hide the flavor of the tapioca . I seem to taste it so easily and hate it. Passed them around the living room warm from the oven to my family: GF and normals and they got rave reviews. Any left over will get iced tomorrow.
Last Christmas I suggested you try your hand at a rolled sugar cookie …don’t know if that registered with you? But at any rate you made this glutenfree mom and her daughter very happy!!! Hubbie was happy too but he has his own Martha Stewart Sugar Cookies already…and he liked these better. Hah!
This year’s request (maybe I’ve missed it in your bread archive) is an artisan bread baked in a cast iron pot very hot in the oven. Have you seen recipes for this type of bread? My dad was a baker and I miss a good chewy crust. If you have a bread like that I would love to try it!
Just about to bake a double batch of these for the 3 time in two weeks. We’re obviously loving them
Haha, that’s awesome!!
I really loved these cookies. My husband has always been good about trying gluten free food because I have to eat that way, but he actually requested I make these a second time because he loved them so much. Thank you for sharing this! The only trouble I had was making the icing too thick. I’m new at royal icing.
Haha, that’s awesome!! I’ve heard of quite a few that have had to make multiple batches, and it’s not just for those that have to eat gluten-free either!
The icing is a bit finicky, but by playing around, you’ll get it. If it’s too thick, add water until you get the 10 second rule (explained on http://www.sweetopia.net), and if it ends up too runny, then add more icing sugar. enjoy!!
These are the best sugar cookies I’ve ever made, glutenous or not. I’m fairly new to gluten free and there is definetely a learning curve to gf baking. I followed the recipe exactly and they came out perfect. I rolled the first half a little to thin and they baked fine, they just didn’t puff at all. The second half was thicker and they puffed a little. Thank you.
Would you be able to substitute an all-purpose gluten free flour for the rice/potato/tapioca flour?
You could try it. Be sure to check if your blend contains xanthan or not, if it does, omit that as well.
Wow! I substituted arrowroot starch for potato. These are fabulous! The almond extract really adds to the flavor and the texture is wonderful! Thank you, thank you, thank you for sharing this. It’s sure to be a family favorite!
I made these yesterday and I just have to say THANK YOU!!! I thought I wasn’t going to be able to have my beloved cookies again!! But they ARE DELISH!! Next time I’ll try your icing, I just did powdered sugar with coconut milk. time to start buying new cookie cutters again!! My favorite is the armadillo!!
We enjoyed your rolled/cut sugar cookies for Christmas. The dough was easy to work with, and the cookies are every bit as good as any Christmas sugar cookies I’ve tasted. Thank you for sharing the recipe!
I made these for Christmas and a batch of wheat based roll out cookies too. My wheat eaters preferred the gluten free ones! Well done!
I want to thank you for your recipes! I made your gluten free peanut butter cup cookies, white chocolate peppermint cookies, and your banana chocolate chip muffins. They all turned out great!! Thank you so much!!
I made these and they were perfect!!! I used Nameste flour instead of individual flours and they were still perfect!!!
Can I use brown rice flour as opposed to white rice flour? I do not have white rice flour. These look amazing!!
Thanks, Tiffany! You should be able to, the cookies may just have a slightly different colour, not quite as ‘white’, but they should work well.