I’ve always loved a simple, classic, frosted sugar cookie. Iced and decorated for a holiday? Even better! Valentine’s Day is one of my favorite holidays solely because of the aesthetic — hearts, white, pink, red, pastels and all things love? It’s just too cute to pass up. Sugar cookies, namely conversation heart shaped ones, make the perfect little holiday activity.

As always, Alexa helped me in the kitchen — from finding the perfect recipe to ordering all of the tools and ingredients. I love cooking with my favorite Food Network stars, award-winning chefs and cookbook authors — all from the comfort of my own kitchen with my Amazon Echo Show! If you have an Echo Show, try "Alexa, open Food Network Kitchen" to stream full episodes of Food Network cooking shows. Or, try "Alexa, show cooking classes" to choose from live and on-demand classes taught by your favorite chefs.

Save any recipe you see to try later — simply say, "Alexa, save recipe" while watching a Food Network Kitchen show. Then get the ingredients sent to your door when it’s time to cook by adding your ingredients your grocery list. By enabling the Food Network Kitchen skill on Echo Show, you'll be able to access your saved recipes and sync up your progress in classes and shows.

I found this recipe on my Amazon Echo Show and it was perfect. These cookies are soft and buttery with crisp edges. The dough holds it’s shape wonderfully in the oven. Sharp and precise; no misshapen hearts!

The most important part, like usual, is to chill the cookie dough. This ensures the cookies hold their shape. The unique part about this sugar cookie recipe is that you chill the cookie dough *after* rolling it out. After the cookie dough is prepared, divide in two, and roll out each portion. My little trick? Roll out your sugar cookie dough onto lightly floured silicone baking mats. The mats won’t slide around. Then use the mats for baking the cookies.

Ingredients

1 ½ cups butter, softened
2 cups white sugar
4 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

Royal Icing

4 cups (480g) confectioners’ sugar, sifted
3 Tablespoons meringue powder
9–10 Tablespoons room temperature water
Americolor Soft Gel Paste Color Kit for coloring

Directions

Step 1

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt. Cover, and chill dough for at least one hour (or overnight).

Step 2

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.

Step 3

Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven. Cool completely.

Make the icing: In a large bowl using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, beat all of the icing ingredients together on high speed for 5 minutes. When lifting the whisk up off the icing, the icing should drizzle down and smooth out within 10-12 seconds. If it’s too thick, add a little more water. (On particularly dry days, I use up to 12-14 Tablespoons water total.) If it’s too thin, add a little more sifted confectioners’ sugar. Separate icing into 6 different bowls. Stir in 1 tiny drop of the following colors into each bowl, 1 color per bowl: pink, violet, green, yellow, and orange. The 6th bowl is for the writing. Use 2-3 drops of red.

Add icing to piping bag fitted with round icing tip #5. Decorate cookies with colored icing. Use round icing tip #1 for writing. Do not cover cookies as icing sets. Icing will set within 2-3 hours.

Decorated or plain cookies stay fresh covered at room temperature for 5 days or in the refrigerator for up to 10 days.