Basic Sugar Cut Out Cookies - cooking recipe

Ingredients

1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup shortening
3 cups plain flour
spices
chocolate chips (optional) or ground ginger, etc (optional)

Preparation

Cream together sugar and butter (can use all butter or half and half like I do).
Beat in the egg and vanilla.
If using spices add them at this point, I like a combination of 1 tsp ground ginger, 1 tsp of cinnamon and half a tsp of allspice. but have also made them using a cup of chocolate chips.
Add in the flour a cup at a time (if you are finding it a little dry add a tsp or so of water).
Roll out between two sheets of baking paper (thanks wife2abadge for this tip!) and place onto ungreased cookie sheets.
I roll out about half a centimetre thick (I'm in Europe and don't do inches, sorry!) when cutting out and put on an ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake at 400 for about 6-10 minutes, the time taken depends on the size of cutters you have used.
Cool for a minute on the cookie sheet then transfer to a wire rack before decorating.
(This is just a personal note for me! 1 cup butter = 225g).