Christmas Cookie Tree

Our most delicious decoration yet!

Culinary Tools:

• 3-quart Mixing Bowl
• 5-quart Mixing Bowl
• 2 Cookie Sheets (7-piece Bakeware Set)

Ingredients:

• 3½ cups wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1½ cups unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tablespoons skim milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• ½ teaspoon almond extract

Procedure:

Preheat oven at 350 °F. In the 3-quart Mixing Bowl, combine flour and baking powder. In the 5-quart Mixing Bowl, beat butter and sugar until creamy. Add egg, milk, vanilla and almond extract; mix well. Gradually add flour mixture to butter mixture; continue beating until dough is homogeneous. Divide it into 2 balls.

Flatten each ball over a floured surface, until 1/8-inch thick. Cut dough into four different star-shape sizes. Place them on the Cookie Sheets, leaving enough space between them.

Bake for 12 minutes or until the edges are light golden brown. Take cookies out of the oven and wait until they have cooled off before removing from the sheets. Repeat until all cookies are baked.

To assemble and Decorate Each Tree:

• Decorating icing, green and yellow
• Chocolate candies

Tree Assembling:

Place one of the largest stars on a plate or tray. Begin stacking remaining stars from largest to smallest, putting the green icing around each cookie to secure them in place; alternate position of points of each star as stacking continues to create tree. Decorate trees with chocolate candies. Lastly, top each tree with one of the smallest stars, colored with the yellow icing.