Baking with the Easter Bunny

This week I had a special guest over to help me with some Easter baking and basket making. Caroline lives just a couple houses down from me and you’ve probably heard me mention her and her family on the blog once or twice before. I’ve known her for her entire 7 year old life and she’s definitely a pretty little shopper at heart. She also loves to bake and we had a blast making a few fun recipes I created for the holiday this weekend.

Caroline has never met a stuffed animal she didn’t like, so I wasn’t entirely surprised to find this little helper joining us.

What you will need:

4 cups almond flour (We used Bob’s Red Mill)

6 to 8 Tbsp. butter

1/2 cup honey

2 eggs

1/2 tsp. sea salt

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1/2 tsp. baking powder

 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Combine the almond flour, sea salt and baking powder in the food processor.

Add the butter a few pats at a time. Mix in the honey, vanilla and eggs until well combined.

 

Use your hands to roll the batter into large gumball sized balls.

To make the Snickerdoodles: Combine 3 Tbls. sugar with one Tbls. cinnamon. Mix well.

 

Roll the balls in the cinnamon/sugar mixture and place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Lightly flatten the cookies with the bottom of a glass cup and place in the oven. Cook for 12 to 15 minutes until they start to look slightly crisp. Cookies will be soft when removed from oven, but will set after 10 to 15 minutes.

To make the Thumbprints: Place the raw cookie balls on a cookie sheet and cook for 5 to 7 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool for a few minutes. Use a small spoon to place a hole in each cookie (I used a 1/4 tsp. measuring spoon). Fill each hole with jam (I used St. Dalfour France Red Raspberry). Replace tray to oven and bake for an additional 7 to 10 minutes. Cookies will be soft when removed from oven, but will set after 10 to 15 minutes.

Full disclosure: I don’t normally dress like June Cleaver to bake cookies… I had asked Caroline’s mom to send her over in Easter-ish attire, so I thought I should dress likewise.

I made these Snickerdoodles with regular flour before Caroline and Mo joined me. Regular flour is a bit more messy than almond flour and I was still dressed in my gym clothes. 🙂 Here is the recipe:

For the cookies:

1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup, plus two Tbls. sugar

1 egg

1/2 tsp. vanilla

1 cup, plus 4 Tbsp. flour

1/4 tsp. sea salt

1 tsp. baking powder

For the topping:

4 Tbsp. cinnamon

4 Tbsp. sugar

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line two large cookie sheets with parchment paper.

Sift the flour, sea salt and baking powder into a large mixing bowl. Cream the butter, sugar and egg with an electric mixer until smooth. Add in the vanilla. Combine the wet and dry ingredients in a large bowl with a wooden spoon. Cover cookie mixture and place in the refrigerator for ten to fifteen minutes to set.

Remove dough from refrigerator and roll into large gumball sized balls. Flatten the balls with the bottom of a glass cup and place in the preheated oven. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes or until the cookies appear lightly brown. Remove from oven and let cool. Cookies will be soft when removed from oven, but will firm up after ten to fifteen minutes.

(Recipe adapted from cooks.com)

  

As I am much more of a cook than a baker, I normally never like to make the same thing twice. Mr. Pretty Little Shopper was looking over my shoulder with a stern eye as I was baking these, but ended up saying these were the best Snickerdoodles he ever had. He’s a cookie connoisseur, so I consider that to be an Easter miracle. 🙂

 

We had so much fun baking these cookies. Please let me know what you think of the recipes. And check back tomorrow to see how we packaged up these cookies for our Easter Baskets.

Photos by Mo Summers.

xoxo,

Lisa