Rolled Cookies

This is one of our treasured holiday recipes. It's wonderful just as rolled cookies. However I use it almost exclusively for our filled-cookies for which we have three standard fillings: mince-without-meat, apricot, and prune. These are extra special little tarts.

Ingredients

1	cup	Unsalted ButterSoftened to room temperature
1	cup	White Sugar
4		Egg/sHard boiled and then separated; yolks to be used for cookies and whites as you like (try Eggs Goldenrod)
4		Egg YolksUncooked
3¾	cups	Flour, All Purpose, Unbleached
¼	tsp	Salt
1	tsp	Almond Extract
½	cup	Evaporated Milk

Directions

1	In a smallish bowl,mix together the flour and salt
2	In a good sized mixing bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until well-blended.
3	Sieve the cooked egg yolks onto the top of the mixture and beat in. Add the uncooked egg yolks and mix well together. Add the almond extract. Mix the ingredients together until well-incorporated.
4	Add the mixed dry ingredients and mix just until there's no more flour showing.
5	Form the dough into a sort of loaf shape about five or so inches in diameter. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least two hours, and up to a week.
6	Preheat oven to four hundred degrees.
7	Use greased cookie sheets.
8	Roll dough to about one quarter inch for plain cookies, and one eighth inch for filled-cookies.
9	For plain cookies use cookie cutter of your choice, place the cookies on the baking sheets and bake just until the edges begin to brown somewhat, about seven or so minutes.
10	For filled cookies use two- to three-inch round cookie cutters. Cut enough cookies to fill your sheet. Place a good teaspoon of filling on each round. Then cut enough rounds as needed. Then, I cut the tops to designate the type filling they have, such as a P for prune. This helps the cookie eaters to choose their preference. It also provides a simple way to allow the cookies to bake best. Of course, you can choose to cut the tops as ever you like.
11	Bake at least nine minutes, or until the cookies are quite browned at the edges. I've found that it's important to bake the filled version of these quite well, so that the cookies maintain their shape and don't soften to much.
12	These are a bit of work, and well worth it.