|

Pink Marble Heart Sugar Cookies Recipe

ByRita Joy
Jump to Recipe

Perfect as valentines cookies or any special occasion, these heart sugar cookies are made with marble colored sugar cookies dough. It’s a colorful twist on classic rolled sugar cookies that turn out so pretty you don’t even need to frost them. (Or you can, if you want.)

This morning my cell phone gave a little “ding” indicating someone had just sent a message.

It was a relative of mine who shared some pictures of the marble heart sugar cookies she was making today. They inspired me so quickly, I couldn’t wait to try them myself!

These pretty heart sugar cookies are a great idea for Valentine’s Day – or any holiday for that matter. Just switch up the colors and shapes for different occasions. Wouldn’t these be cute in blues and greens cut in an Easter egg shape for Easter?

Why you’ll like these pink marble heart sugar cookies

Marble sugar cookies are super fun to make! It makes you feel like you’re a painter putting together an abstract painting. It’s both unpredictable and unexpectedly beautiful in the end. This would be such a fun family activity to do with your kids or grandkids.

This sugar cookies recipe turns out soft and chewy, and you don’t need to spend time chilling the dough before baking them. They don’t spread out as they bake, so they hold whatever shape you cut them out well.

You can customize these to be whatever colors you’d like. Changing up the cookie cutter shape could make these appropriate for all occasions.

Ingredients for rolled heart sugar cookies

(A printable recipe card is located at the bottom of this post. Affiliate links are also included for some items throughout this post for your shopping convenience.)

  • 2 large eggs
  • 1/3 cup milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 cups white sugar
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 4 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup cold butter
  • Wilton food coloring paste in colors rose petal pink and Christmas red

Step by Step instructions for marble sugar cookies dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and prepare 2 baking sheets by lining them with parchment paper.
  2. In a medium sized bowl, beat the 2 large eggs with a whisk. Add in the milk, vanilla, white sugar and baking soda and whisk together until mixed together well. Set aside.
  3. In a seperate large bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and salt. Cut in the *cold butter with a pastry blender or 2 knives until the mixture resembles course oats. *See tip for cutting in cold butter below.
Cut in cold butter with a pastry blender or 2 knives. You may want to grate frozen butter to make this step easy!
Whisk together the liquid ingredients with the baking soda in a seperate bowl.
  1. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and stir until just combined. The dough will be very crumbly.
This sugar cookie dough will be very crumbly when mixed together. Kneading it gently to get it to stick together makes it the perfect no chill sugar cookie dough.
  1. Turn the dough out on to a lightly floured surface or pastry cloth and knead it together with your hands until it sticks together. Be careful not to overwork the dough.
  2. Divide the dough into 3 portions. Color one red, one pink, and leave the other white. Knead the coloring in with your hands. If you stop kneading it when it is a bit striped with color (as you can see with the red dough shown below), it gives the dough a more marble effect.
Sugar cookies dough separated into 3 dough balls. One is colored red marble, one is white, and one is pink.
  1. Pinch off pieces of each color and alternate them on your rolling surface so that each piece is touching each other. Place a piece of parchment paper on the top and roll the dough to about 1/4 inch thick.
Small chunks of different colored sugar cookies dough in alternating spaces on a pastry cloth ready to be rolled together.
Parchment paper on the top of the sugar cookie dough with a rolling pin on it.
A sheet of rolled out marble colored sugar cookies dough.

  1. Cut with a heart shaped cookie cutter and arrange them on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake at 375 degrees for 6 minutes, or until just lightly golden brown on the bottom. Baking times will differ based on how thick the dough is and how large the cookie cutter you used is, so keep an eye on the baking time for your specific cookies.
Heart cookies in marble sugar cookie dough on a baking sheet.
A pan of baked heart sugar cookies.

  1. Let cookies cool for 5 minutes on the baking sheet before transferring them to a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
Heart sugar cookies stacked up.

Tips & Tricks for Sugar Cookies

  • *Cutting in butter tip! – To make cutting in butter easy and quick, try grating it frozen and then adding it to the flour mixture. I measure the butter first, place it in the freezer, and then grate it when it’s frozen (right before starting to mix up the cookies). Once fully grated, I place the grated butter in a bowl and set it in the freezer to keep cold. Then when it’s time to use it, I remove it from the freezer, dump it in the flour mixture and it mixes up in seconds!
  • If your cookie dough is too sticky to roll out, try adding a bit more flour and sprinkle flour on the rolling surface and top of the dough when you roll it out.
  • If your cookies spread when they are baking, try chilling the dough first. The thickness of the dough may affect if they spread as well, so try rolling them a bit thinner if they are spreading (but be sure not to overbake them then if you want soft & chewy cookies.)
  • I like to bake these cookies 2 pans at a time to save time. If you choose to do so, place each baking sheet on alternating oven racks and sides of the oven, and switch the pans around half way through the baking time.
Heart sugar cookies that have marble dough arranged to look like striped cookies.
Have fun making patterns with this colored sugar cookie dough. If you line the colors in strips, you can make striped sugar cookies!

Sugar Cookie Frosting Recipes

Here are a few different options for sugar cookie frosting;

FAQs about rolled sugar cookies

I use an antique pastry cloth and rolling pin cover that was my grandma’s! (Here is a similar set.) There are so many other options, though, I wrote a whole post on rolling dough products and tips.

If this sugar cookie dough recipe is sticky to start with, check the ingredients list again to see if you may have mis-measured something. I find that this dough starts out very dry and crumbly and needs to be kneaded to stick together at first.

However, the longer you work with it, the warmer it gets and that may cause it to get sticky. If so, add flour 1 tablespoon at a time and work it in, or refrigerate it to chill it. That should help it to become easier to work with again.

The choice is up to you! We prefer them soft and chewy at our house, so I try to make them that way by not overbaking them. If you want them crispy, though, just leave them in the oven until you see them turning a bit golden brown around the edges.

If you want sugar or sprinkles to stick to the cookie dough itself, sprinkle them on before baking. (Beware, though that some sprinkle colors may run while baking.) You can also put sprinkles or colored sugar on top of the fresh frosting after they are frosted.

Although sugar cookies and snickerdoodles have many of the same ingredients, they are not the same. Snickerdoodles typically have cream of tarter in them and they are not a cut out cookie.

I store sugar cookies in an airtight container or resealable bag. They can be kept at room temperature for 2 days. Beyond that, place them in the freezer to store them.

I prefer buttercream icing, personally, on sugar cookies. I mix it up in a very simple way. Here is my super easy frosting for sugar cookies recipe.

And, perfect for this specific recipe, here is marbled frosting as pretty as these cookies!

Heart sugar cookies sitting beside the heart shaped cookie cutter to illustrate that the dough doesn't spread during the baking process.
This sugar cooke recipe holds its shape well. The actual cutters are on the side of the cookies in this picture.

I can’t find the exact set of heart shaped cookie cutters as pictured above, but here is a set of nesting heart shaped cookie cutters that is similar in shape and size to what I used.

Other sugar cookies recipes:

Pin this to remember for later!

Marble Heart Sugar Cookies Recipe

Marble Heart Sugar Cookies Recipe

Yield: 48
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 12 minutes
Total Time: 27 minutes

This colorful twist on classic rolled sugar cookies makes these marble heart sugar cookies perfect Valentines cookies. Coloring basic sugar cookie dough into different colors and rolled together makes a beautiful marbling effect. They turn out so pretty you don’t even need to frost them. (Or you can, if you want!)

Ingredients

  • 2 large eggs
  • 1/3 cup milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 cups white sugar
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 4 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup cold butter
  • Wilton food coloring paste in colors rose petal pink and Christmas red

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and prepare 2 baking sheets by lining them with parchment paper.
  2. In a medium sized bowl, beat the 2 large eggs with a whisk. Add in the milk, vanilla, white sugar and baking soda and whisk together until mixed together well. Set aside.
  3. In a seperate large bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and salt. Cut in the *cold butter with a pastry blender or 2 knives until the mixture resembles course oats. *See tip for cutting in cold butter below.
  4. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and stir until just combined. The dough will be very crumbly.
  5. Turn the dough out on to a lightly floured surface or pastry cloth and knead it together with your hands until it sticks together. Be careful not to overwork the dough.
  6. Divide the dough into 3 portions. Color one red, one pink, and leave the other white. Knead the coloring in with your hands. If you stop kneading it when it is a bit striped with color (as you can see with the red dough shown below), it gives the dough a more marble effect.
  7. Pinch off pieces of each color and alternate them on your rolling surface so that each piece is touching each other. Place a piece of parchment paper on the top and roll the dough to about 1/4 inch thick.
  8. Cut with a heart shaped cookie cutter and arrange them on 2 parchment lined baking sheet. Bake both pans at the same time, alternating racks, and switching them halfway though at 375 degrees for 6 minutes, or until just lightly golden brown on the bottom. Baking times will differ based on how thick the dough is and how large the cookie cutter you used is, so keep an eye on the baking time for your specific cookies.
  9. Let cookies cool for 5 minutes on the baking sheet before transferring them to a wire cooling rack to cool completely.

Notes

Yeild of the number of cookies will differ based on the size of your cookie cutters and how thick you roll out the dough.

Did you make this recipe?

Leave a comment or share a photo on Instaram and tag @harbourbreeze

© Rita Joy
Category: Recipes

Similar Posts

DON’T MISS A THING!

Join my list for more ideas for you and your home…

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.