Christmas 101’s Rick Rodgers Shares His Amazing Sugar Cookie Recipe and (Hard-Won) Holiday Baking Hacks!
By Renae Baker
My carolers are crazy about the sugar and gingerbread cookies I make for our annual “cookie rehearsal!” I also make a mean plum pudding, and I jump at the chance to roast the turkey for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners. Don’t be too impressed. I’m not a great cook. When I was a child, I found ways to ruin E-Z Bake Oven cakes. But, what a difference a good teacher can make! My teacher is Internationally acclaimed, award-winning culinary teacher and cookbook author Rick Rodgers. Bon Appétit magazine awarded Rick the prestigious Food and Entertaining Award for “Outstanding Culinary Teacher,” (And I must that, as a musical theater person, learning from someone named “Richard Rodgers” feels juuust riiiight.) His recipes have added such joy t0 my celebrations, that I consider him “Holiday Royalty.” (See how to find his free Facebook tips and online culinary classes at the end of this article!)
I became aware of Rick one late Autumn day in 1997 when I walked into a Restoration Hardware store in Manhattan. I probably squeaked out loud when I laid eyes upon his welcoming, paperback cookbook titled Christmas 101! Above the title is written, “100 festive recipes with menus and timetables for stress-free holiday entertaining.”
That was the year I resolved to overcome my fears and roast my first turkey. Rodgers’ introduction to each recipe explained why he chose to do things the way he did. I followed his every direction and – lo and behold – I served up a delicious, juicy Thanksgiving turkey, with the best gravy I’d ever tasted! (25 years and 50+ turkey dinners later, this recipe combo has never failed me.)
Next, I took on the Christmas 101 sugar cookie recipe. After rave reviews, I added his gingerbread cookie to my short-but-growing repertoire of recipes I felt confident and enthusiastic about. Soon, the plum and figgy puddings followed. There is not a recipe I’ve tried, from Christmas 101, that hasn’t thrilled me! It only took me about 23 years to realize that this culinary Mr. Rodgers might enjoy hearing what a special part of my family’s and my carolers’ lives he has been. I wrote to him a couple of years ago, and he was gracious and generous in his response. This Fall, we sat down for our first of what I hope will be many interviews. I’m so excited to share his delicious recipes and holiday baking hacks with you!
As I am preparing for our upcoming “Cookie Caroling Rehearsal,” I’ve got sugar cookies on my mind, so this was the first recipe I wanted to discuss with Rick. If you are planning to make a slew of cookies for the December holidays, do yourself a favor and read this now!
Rick jumps right in telling me that he LOVES to teach! He appreciates that he can see that he has really taught me something. “It’s one thing to say ‘I really love your recipe for pumpkin pie,’” Rodgers begins, “but it’s another to say, ‘You know what you taught me? That I don’t have to use fresh pumpkin. You released me from the tyranny of Thanksgiving!’”
After thirty-five years of teaching live culinary classes, Rodgers found the schlepping of so many supplies on and off airplanes post-9/11 to various venues across the country to be a hassle. “It wasn’t fun anymore,” he exhales. “I’ve had enough people name babies after me,” he laughs. “I’m done!” But with online classes becoming normalized during pandemic times, he has taken on the challenge of learning how to adapt his teaching skills to the contemporary format. As part of our Broadway Carolers Diary series with Rick Rodgers, I will share his recipes and keep you informed of his latest online cooking classes.
The Recipe:
Sugar Cookies 101
Shared with the generous permission of Rick Rodgers
Makes about 3 1/2 dozen cookies, depending on size
Make ahead: The dough must chill for at least 1 ½ hours. The cookies can be prepared 1 week ahead, stored in an airtight container at room temperature.
A perfect sugar cookie must have buttery flavor, melt-in-your-mouth texture, yet be firm enough to stand up to decorating. In typical sugar cookie recipes, the butter and sugar are creamed together, but I cut the butter into the dry ingredients like a pie dough to increase the cookies’ flakiness. For added tenderness, I also combine shortening with the butter and cornstarch with the flour.
• If you want to freeze these, I recommend freezing them undecorated, as the icing won’t hold up well. They can be kept frozen for up to 1 month. About a week before serving, defrost the cookies, decorate, and store in air-tight containers* at room temperature.
Ingredients:
2 ¾ cups all-purpose flour
¼ cup cornstarch
1 cup sugar
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
½ cup vegetable shortening, at room temperature
⅓ cup heavy cream **
1 large egg plus 1 large yolk
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
Decorating Icing (recipe below)
Position the racks in the top and bottom thirds of the oven and preheat to 350° F.
In a large bowl, whisk the flour, cornstarch, sugar, baking powder, and salt to combine. Add the butter and shortening. Using a hand-held electric mixer at low speed, move the beaters through the mixture until the butter and shortening are uniformly cut into tiny crumbs and the mixture resembles coarse cornmeal, 2 to 3 minutes. In a small bowl, mix the cream, egg, egg yolk, and vanilla well. Using a wooden spoon, stir the cream mixture into the dry ingredients, and mix well to form a soft dough. Gather the dough together and divide into two thick disks. Wrap each disk in plastic wrap. Refrigerate until chilled, about 1 ½ hours. (The dough can be prepared u to 1 day ahead.)
Remove one disk of dough from the refrigerator and let stand at room temperature, 5 to 10 minutes. (If the dough has been chilled for longer than 1 ½ hours, it may take a few more minutes.) Unwrap the dough and place on a floured work surface. Lightly sprinkle the top of the dough with flour. Roll out the dough ⅛ inch thick, or slightly thicker for softer cookies. As you roll out the dough, it will become easier to work with, and tiny cracks on the surface will smooth out and disappear. Occasionally run a long knife under the dough so it doesn’t stick to the work surface, and dust more flour under the dough, if needed. If the kitchen is warm, roll out the dough on a large piece of lightly floured wax paper, checking to be sure the dough doesn’t buckle. Slip the paper onto a large baking sheet and refrigerate for about 10 minutes before cutting out cookies.
Using cookie cutters, (See tip #1 below) cut out the cookies and transfer to nonstick cookie sheets, placing the cookies 1 inch apart. Gently knead the scraps together and form into another disk. Wrap and chill for 5 minutes before rolling out again to cut out more cookies.
Bake, switching the positions of the cookie sheets from top to bottom and front to back halfway through baking, just until the edges of the cookies are barely beginning to turn golden, about 10 minutes. Do not overbake. Let stand on the cookie sheets for 2 minutes, then transfer to wire cooking racks to cool completely. Decorate as desired with Decorating Icing.
Decorating Icing Recipe:
Makes about ¾ cup, enough for about 3 dozen cookies
When you want a shiny, slick surface on your cookies that can be sprinkled with colored sugar or other goodies, make this easy icing. For a thicker, opaque surface, use the minimum amount of milk. For a thinner, translucent look, use a bit more milk to make a thinner icing. The amount of milk needed to reach your desired thickness will vary, depending on the humidity.
Ingredients:
2 cups confectioners’ sugar
3 to 4 tablespoons milk, as needed
Food coloring as needed (optional)
Sift the confectioners’ sugar through a wire sieve into a medium bowl. Using a rubber spatula, blend enough milk into the sugar to reach the desired consistency. If desired, divide the icing into individual bowls or paper cups and tint with food coloring. When not using, to prevent a crust from forming, cover each bowl tightly with plastic wrap or press a moist paper towel directly on the icing surface.
Non-Stresstive Holiday Baking Tips from Rick:
“I don’t want you to have to buy ONE more thing for Christmas!” Rick states with great understanding. He wants you to get the most holiday cheer for your time and efforts. That means choosing the cookie designs that give the most delight for your time, effort and money. He recommends these time and money-saving practices:
1) Choose only a few cookie cutters that have big appeal and that take minimal frosting colors. For instance, Christmas trees (green, optional white drizzle) Candy canes, (white, red,) and Stars of David if you are treating Hanukkah celebrators, (white or blue.) Of course you can go as crazy as you’d like with the sprinkles! As Rick looks back on his days of painstakingly brushing pink cheeks, blue eyes, white beards, white fur trim on red coats, black buckles and boots on each Santa Claus cookie, only to see them scarfed down in 2 seconds, I can see the peace on earth spread across his face as he describes dropping whole cookies, face-down into a single color of Decorating Icing. Having minimal shapes means having minimal colors and much-reduced clean-up after the decorating fun.
2) Once your cookies are finished, you may want to package them up in boxes and give them to loved ones. That’s often the moment you realize you don’t have enough – or the right – air-tight containers. Rick recommends going to your local variety of 99¢ stores and buying plastic shoe boxes! But DO THIS NOW, because they will likely be hard to find in December!
3) As you walk down the baking aisle at the grocery store, or place your early November home delivery, NOW is the time to stock up on those holiday baking items you know you’ll need in December. I am nodding as Rick warns, “You KNOW you’re gonna need molasses, Caro Syrup, baking soda, confectioner’s sugar and sprinkles. You don’t want to run out of flour and sugar in December. Get them now, before the aisle gets crowded!”
As you may have gathered from reading this article, Rick is a fun guy! Although he has every right to, he doesn’t take himself too seriously, and he doesn’t expect you to either. You can find his timely tips and short videos on Facebook: www.facebook.com/CookbookRick and see for yourself. I urge you to check him out TODAY, before you start that pumpkin pie, because he has already posted how to make it SO much better with one simple correction. For whole cooking classes from baking your turkey to Austro-Hungarian desserts and – SOON – Christmas delights, go to his website: https://coffeeandcake.org/.
Happy “Festive and Non-Stresstive” holiday baking!
