Rolled Animal Cookies
Contributed by Diane S.

                     *  Exported from  MasterCook  *

                    1986 Winner: Rolled Animal Cookies

Recipe By     :
Serving Size  : 48   Preparation Time :0:00
Categories    : Cookies

  Amount  Measure       Ingredient -- Preparation Method
--------  ------------  --------------------------------
   1      C             Butter, softened
   1      C             Sugar
   1                    Egg
   2      Tb            Whipping cream
   1      T             Baking powder
     1/2  T             Baking soda
     1/2  T             Salt
   1      T             Vanilla
   3      C             Sifted all-purpose flour
                        Decorations: colored sugar,
                        Raisins, chocolate
                        Sprinkles, chocolate chips

Preparation time: 45 minutes Chilling time: Several hours Baking time: 7
minutes

1. Cream butter. Gradually add sugar and cream well. Blend in the egg,
cream, baking powder, baking soda, salt and vanilla. Gradually add flour
and mix well. Chill dough until firm, several hours (it is hard to roll
out otherwise).

2. Heat oven to 400 degrees. Roll out dough on a floured board to about
1/8- inch thick. Cut into desired shapes with a flour-dipped cookie
cutter. Place on ungreased or lightly greased cookie sheet.

3. Decorate with colored sugar and chocolate sprinkles and use raisins
or chocolate chips for the eyes of the animals. Bake for 5-7 minutes or
until a little brown. Cool on racks. Don't forget to cut the little
holes if you wish to hang on the tree.

Note: Dough will keep several days or a week in the refrigerator if you
don't get around to cutting right away. I store the cookies in tightly
covered tins and they are very good keepers if the children don't find
them.

Winner Beverly Bergstrom of Hinsdale recounts making rolled animal
cookies: "We called them animal cookies although there were many cutters
that were not animals. We would cut small pieces of paper drinking
straws and insert them in the top of each cookie and then bake them. The
little piece of straw was removed just as the cookies came from the
oven, leaving a perfect little hole to put a colored string through so
the cookie could be hung on our huge Christmas tree.

"My sister and I would always make sure lots of the cookies were hung
around the back of the tree. The tree was in the corner of the living
room leaving a space behind, where we could crawl in. A favorite pastime
during the holiday season was to lie on the floor behind the tree and
using no hands, take tasty bites of the cookies, leaving behind the
empty strings decorating the tree. Grandma would always pretend anger
when she 'discovered' the empty strings and no cookie. It was a good
game." from the Chicago Tribune annual Food Guide Holiday Cookie Contest
December 4, 1986