Tartan Christmas Tree Cookies
- 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1/4 cup powdered sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 9 ounces good-quality white chocolate (such as Lindt or Baker's)
- Blue, red and green food coloring
- 2 small resealable plastic bags
- Preheat oven to 325&;deg;F. Using electric mixer, beat unsalted butter in large bowl until light.
- Gradually beat in powdered sugar.
- Beat in vanilla extract.
- Add flour and salt and mix just until combined.
- Gather dough into ball; flatten into disk.
- Wrap disk in plastic and refrigerate until firm, about 3 hours.
- Roll out dough on floured work surface to 1/8-inch thickness, frequently lifting and turning dough to prevent sticking.
- Using 5-inch Christmas tree cookie cutter, cut out cookies.
- Gather dough scraps together.
- Repeat rolling and cutting dough scraps to make 10 cookies total.
- Transfer cookies to 2 heavy large baking sheets, spacing apart.
- Bake until cookies begin to brown around edges, about 15 minutes.
- Cool on baking sheet 5 minutes.
- Transfer cookies to racks and cool completely.
- Melt chocolate in top of double boiler over simmering water, stirring until smooth.
- Divide melted chocolate among 3 small bowls.
- Working quickly so that chocolate does not harden, mix 8 drops blue food coloring into 1 bowl.
- Spread blue chocolate evenly over surface of cookies.
- Mix 8 drops green food coloring into second bowl of melted chocolate.
- Mix 8 drops red food coloring into third bowl of melted chocolate.
- Spoon green chocolate into plastic bag.
- Cut off 1 bottom tip of bag to allow small ribbon of chocolate to come out.
- Repeat procedure with pink chocolate and another plastic bag.
- Using green chocolate, pipe 4 diagonal lines from left to right across cookies, spacing evenly.
- Using pink chocolate, pipe 4 diagonal lines from left to right across cookies, alongside green lines.
- Repeat with diagonal lines going from right to left.
- Let cookies stand until chocolate sets, about 2 hours.
- (Can be prepared 3 days ahead.
- Store cookies between sheets of waxed paper in airtight container at room temperature.)
unsalted butter, powdered sugar, vanilla, flour, salt, white chocolate, bags
Taken from www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/tartan-christmas-tree-cookies-3010 (may not work)