I've offered to bake cookies for a good friend's wedding. She's not overly picky...just so they are sugar cookies & have a mongram/initial. I am a bridesmaid in the wedding and have to travel from south GA to Morristown, TN for the wedding (7-8 hour) trip. I plan to make the cookies at the beginning of the week, but need some advice.

What recipe would work best for about 200 round cookies - 2 to 3 inch diameter? What's the earliest I need to bake the cookies and they still be fresh on Saturday? Also, I plan to use royal icing flavored with lemon for the initial. Is this the tastiest option? Any advice for packing the cookies so they will be in great shape once I arrive? We will package the cookies in Tennessee.

Feel free to post pics, etc. The wedding is Aug. 15, so I still have time to play around with ideas.

I use a martha stewart sugar cookies recipe. I haven't tried any on this site to direct you to. If I were you, I would bake the cookies and freeze them. I place them in zip lock bags separated by sheets of wax paper. This way you are not exhausted by the time you are leaving for the wedding. I would then take them out when you are ready to decorate - allowing several hours for the cookies to defrost completely. I would allow two days to decorate. As for the royal icing, I have not tried lemon extract. I have always added almond extract and it is turns out great.

I love the NFSC (No Fail Sugar Cookie) recipe found on this site under the recipe tab. It always woks very well for me. Usually if I need the cookies for Saturday, I bake no sooner than Monday. If you need to bake them sooner, I agree with the previous post, that you should freeze them...I've done that and they turn out fine. I have also frozen decorated cookies and they defrost fine as well.
As far as the flavoring goes, I add vanilla ext and butter flavoring to my royal icing. I love it and everyone raves about it. About 1/2 - 3/4 tsp of each.

If I were you - I'd bake the cookies and freeze the cookies. Then I'd pull them out of the freezer a few minutes before I was going to leave for my trip. I'd drive with them while they are thawing. Then when I got there, I would start decorating them. I'd leave a day for them to dry and then package them the next day.

I guess it really just depends what day you are going to leave for the wedding.

Thanks for all the advice...I will definitely take it and use it!