The BEST Old-Fashioned Butter Cookies (Filled with Sweet Jam)

🔗 Save $6,000 A Year with My Complete Amish Home-Saving Method I teach: https://eliasyoder.com There is a cookie so simple, made of so few things, that once you know it you will never again pay a fortune for a fancy tin of them at the store. Four things. That is all that goes into these. Butter, sugar, flour, and a bit of egg. And from those four humble things, all of which are likely in your kitchen right now, you can make a cookie so tender and buttery and fine that it melts on the tongue, a cookie worthy of company and the holidays and a quiet cup of coffee alike. And with a little spoonful of jam in the center, prettier and finer still. You have likely eaten a cookie like this, for the most famous version comes in a round blue tin, the kind that turns up at Christmas, and those are Danish, a fine old tradition, and I honor it. But a plain butter cookie is not any one people's alone. Near every baking people has made a simple cookie of butter and sugar and flour, and my own people baked theirs too. So I will show you mine, the plain old-fashioned way, and you may put whatever jam you have put up in the center. And here is what I love most about this cookie. It is mostly butter. The butter is the whole soul and flavor of the thing, which makes this the perfect place to use that good sweet butter you churned yourself. A cookie this simple hides nothing, so the better your butter, the better your cookie. INGREDIENTS 150 g (about 2/3 cup) unsalted butter, softened 85 g (about 3/4 cup) powdered sugar A little vanilla (optional) A small pinch of salt 30 g egg white (about 1 large white) 170 g (about 1 1/3 cups) all-purpose flour A few spoonfuls of jam (apricot, or any you have put up) Here is what you will learn: ✔ Why the butter must be soft, not hard and not melted ✔ What creaming really does, and why it makes a tender cookie ✔ Why powdered sugar gives a finer, more melting cookie ✔ Why just egg white, not a whole egg ✔ Why you must not overwork the dough once the flour goes in ✔ How to shape them, with a piping bag OR just your thumb ✔ Why you chill the shaped cookies before baking ✔ How much jam to add so it does not run over ✔ Why you must not overbake a butter cookie ✔ How to store them, and how to make them ahead You do not need a fancy imported tin and you do not need special tools. You need four simple things, your own good butter, and a warm oven. And once you set out a plate of these, tender and buttery with a jewel of jam in the center, you will understand what the old kitchens always knew, that the finest cookie in the world is only four simple things and the hand that made them. Now tell me something down in the comments. What cookies did your family bake, and did your mother or grandmother have a particular one she was known for? And what jam would you put in the center of these? I would dearly love to hear. Tell me. Next time I am going to show you how to make that jam itself, for it seems only right after putting it in the center of these cookies. I will show you how to take the ripe fruit of summer, when it is cheap and plentiful and bursting, and put it up into jars of bright sweet jam that will keep all through the winter and taste of July in the depths of January. Next time, the making of jam. Until then, take good care of the ones at your table. And keep a kitchen that knows the finest cookie in the world is only four simple things, your own good butter, and a hand willing to make them. #buttercookies #cookies #homemadecookies #jamcookies #thumbprintcookies #oldfashionedbaking #fromscratch #scratchbaking #amishcooking #holidaybaking #homestead #baking #cookierecipe #christmascookies #pennsylvaniadutch