Easter Bunny Biccies

I have been a little stressed recently for reasons I shall go into on another post when the time comes, and as I have mentioned before I find the best way for dealing with stress is to shut myself in the kitchen with Heart FM (I love hearing about the congestion on the M25 - makes me relish not living down south) and create. Whether its stuff for the freezer, or treats for the office, it always seems to relax me.

Anyway, I knew we were off the pub on Friday night with friends, and we had hubbys parents coming on Saturday as we were off to a family friends birthday so I thought some baking was in order. A while ago whilst shopping at Cheshire Oaks we were in one of the kitchen shops and I saw this really cute little bunny head shaped cutter. Now we have a rabbit called rather unimaginatively Peter. But there is a snag...we thought it was a boy and its actually a girl! But Pete works for both. So anyway in homage to Pete the cutter was bought and was used to make these rather cute little biccies.

Easter Biccies (sort of based on a recipe from The Cooks Encyclopedia of Cookies Biscuits and Bars)

175g salted butter

300g sugar

1 egg and 1 egg yolk

1 tsp vanilla extract

300g plain flour

2 tsp ground mixed spice

Pre-heat oven to 190deg.

1) Cream the butter and sugar together in a large bowl until light and fluffy

2) Mix in the egg and egg yolk, along with the vanilla essence.

3) Sift in the flour and mixed spice and mix together. Gather the dough in a ball, cover in clingfilm and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

4) Once chilled, roll out the dough on a floured surface until 3mm thick. I made some slightly thicker, but they do puff slightly in the oven.

5) Stamp out the shapes with cutter. The recipe said it made 30, but once again something happened in my mixing bowl and I ended up with hundreds!

6) Bake for about 8 minutes until lightly golden. They will spread slightly in the oven, so make sure they are spaced out on the tray. If you let them go too brown they are fine, just a little crispier.

7) Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Once cook decorate with a little icing coloured with food colouring. Once the icing had set I then popped 5 into a little cellophane bag and tied with a nice piece of ribbon. Forgot to take a picture but they made lovely little Easter gifts. The girls appreciated them and took them home from the pub to eat at a sensible time with a cup of tea. The boys however ate them in the pub!

Easter bunnies waiting to be iced

Easter bunnies iced and waiting to be eaten!