Heart Attack Cookies

Sugar cookies are a blast to make for any occasion. These were a treat for some of my gal pals as a memento of our adventurous and humbling weekend trip.

My husband and his brother ran in the St George marathon on October 3. Unfortunately my brother in law collapsed at mile 23 in full cardiac arrest. Off duty fire fighters (spectators to the race) ran to his aid and began CPR. A volunteer medic was flagged down and rushed to the scene. She happened to have an AED in her shuttle and quickly administered the life saving shock to his heart. After being rushed to the hospital he suffered yet another attack and his heart stopped again. A second shock was given and his heart began beating once more. The doctors stabilized his heart and put 2 stints in. Because of the miraculous tender mercies of God he will live to make a full recovery. We are ever so grateful for the many prayers said, quick thinking of medical professionals, and the constant steady merciful hand of our Father in Heaven. He will return to running and settle the score with the St George Marathon in 2010. Gotta love a fighter!

So back to the cookies! In my little singin' group (Harmony) it is tradition to bring a memento when a rehearsal is missed due to traveling. So what better than patched up hearts! (Thanks for the cutsie band aid idea Missy)

These are super simple SOFT sugar cookies that are perfect for ANY occasion. I got the recipe from one of those Yours, Mine, and Ours recipe books from 1990! But it's a good one, I promise.

Depending on the size of your cookie cutters this recipe usually yields about 2 dozen cookies.

3/4 C butter, softened

3/4 C sugar

2 large eggs

1 t vanilla

2 3/4 C flour

2 t baking powder

Preheat oven to 400. Cream butter and sugar. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Add baking powder and flour, one cup at a time, mixing well after each addition. Dough will be stiff. Divide dough into 2 balls. Do not chill. Roll dough out on floured surface to 1/4" thick. Cut out shapes and place on greased baking sheet.

Bake on top rack of oven for 6-7 minutes. These cookies do not brown, baking longer than 6-7 minutes (unless obviously doughy) will just make them dry, and you unhappy. Remove cookies from pan immediately after removing from oven.

If you don't plan to frost cookies immediately (after cooled) be sure to store them in an air tight container.

When it comes to frosting the cookies you can be as fancy or simple as you'd like. I use either butter cream or cream cheese frosting. Don't have a recipe? Okay you can have mine. The cream cheese frosting is on this blog under September, Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Cakes. When I figure out how to link you there I'll change it. There are a zillion ways to make butter cream frosting. I like this one:

1 Cube butter (please don't use margarine, ick)

4 C powdered sugar

1 t vanilla

3-4 T milk

Cream butter with electric mixer. Add powdered sugar, vanilla and 3 T milk. Slowly mix ingredients together. If frosting is thick and not smooth add another tablespoon of milk. If needed add milk until right consistency is reached. If you whoops and get it too thin, add more powdered sugar. Dye frosting with food coloring. I like to use Wilton paste dyes, they can be found at Michaels, JoAnns, even Wal Mart. Frosting can be spread on with a knife or piped on with pastry bags (or make shift Ziploc pastry bags) depending on your level of fancy.

The band aids are made out of vanilla melting candy that I dyed and piped into a band aid shape on a small piece of wax paper. To get a curved shape I placed each piece of wax paper inside of a mug to set up. After they set I peeled them off, added some detail (more melting candy) and patched up each heart.