Do It Yourself: Baking Tips From The Pros

Patch asked the pros from Heights Bakery and Cafe, which opened on Mother's Day in May 2008, for tips on how you can make your own sugar cookies and decorate them for the Fourth of July. 

It's important to follow the recipe in the order it's been written and stick to the exact measurements, owner Jim Crocker said. 

Here is the family recipe for sugar cookies they provided to Patch:

Ingredients

1 cup butter

1 cup sugar

1 tablespoon milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 1/4 cups unsifted flour

Directions: Cream butter, beat in sugar, egg, milk and vanilla. Add baking powder, and gradually add flour. Chill 1 hour. Make 1-inch balls of dough, place on ungreased baking pan and flatten with hand. 

Although, as Crocker shows in the video, using a bag to pipe out the cookies is much easier and less messy, there are other options too.

He advises, after the dough has been chilled for an hour,  you can lightly flour the board, roll out the dough and press it out. Then you can use glass to cut out sections. 

Another option is to roll the dough like a snake and -- just like the frozen dough you would buy at the store -- cut into sections.

For the more creative ones, you can put food coloring into the dough to give your cookies some festive color.

Besides baked goods, Heights Bakery and Cafe offers a breakfast and lunch menu, as well as catering.

For their parties, residents can have anything catered based on their needs from appetizers to desserts. Val Gaglione, who has been baking for 31 years, said they offer sugar free and gluten free desserts. 

Heights Bakery offers theme cakes for children and adult birthdays. Having a graduation, communion, wedding or bachelorette party? They've got it covered. One of their best sellers is the carrot cake. The pastries and cheese danishes are also popular. They make everything from scratch and use fresh ingredients. 

"We are one of the few hands-on bakeries," Jim Crocker said. 

Editor's note: The recipe featured in the video yields times three the provided recipe here.