A Recipe from Betty Crocker’s New Boys and Girls Cookbook (1974)

About the Recipe

It was a rainy day where I live on the south shore of Long Island, and I thought, what a perfect day for baking cookies with Maxx. This recipe had 2 things going for it right off the bat: It’s right there on the page – “Remember these cookies for something to do on a rainy day” and Maxx’s two favorite things to do right now are to bake cookies and paint. The rain started; we gathered ingredients!

All in all, these are not my favorite sugar cookies (I’m just now realizing that I didn’t publish a post on my favorites, which I’ll have to amend soon…). They’re a honey cookie, really and kind of… meh. But the painting part, I absolutely love! It’s so simple I can’t believe I’ve never seen it before – egg wash paint – brilliant! It doesn’t add any taste, but the colors come out wonderfully.

Though it doesn’t seem like a lot of “paint,” it actually goes quite a long way. The effect is like watercoloring on cookies. Maxx and I used soft watercolor brushes which worked well. So much fun!

Pro-tip for those also painting with toddlers: Pick complimentary colors so that the paint doesn’t come out brown when they inevitably dip their paintbrush in every color at once.

About the book

This is one of those essential kids cookbooks to have in a collection if you collect that sort of thing. I didn’t actually start collecting kids cookbooks until I had a kid, and they’re just so darn cute! This one is kind of a celebration of the original mid-century designs, updated with a little ’70s flair.

The Recipe!

Ingredients:

1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup soft shortening
2/3 cup honey
1 egg
1 t vanilla
2 3/4 cups flour
1 t baking soda
1 t salt

Egg Yolk Paint:
1 egg yolk
1/4 t water
food coloring

Directions:

Mix sugar, shortening, honey, egg and vanilla thoroughly in bowl. Stir together flour, baking soda, and salt in another bowl. Mix the dry ingredients into the shortening mixture. Chill dough 1 hour.

Heat oven to 375*F. Lightly grease a baking sheet.

Divide chilled dough into 3 portions. (Place 2 portions of dough in refrigerator until ready to use.)

On a lightly floured board, roll out dough with floured rolling pin. Roll to 1/4-inch thickness. (For easiest rolling, use a lightly floured cloth-covered board and rolling pin.) Cut into different shapes.

Place on prepared baking sheet. With small paintbrushes, paint designs on cookies with Egg Yolk Paint (below).

Bake 8-10 minutes. For clear colors, do not let cookies brown.

Let cookies cool about 2 minutes on a baking sheet, then cool on a wire rack.

Egg Yolk Paint:
Blend egg yolk and water well in small bowl. Divide mixture among several small custard cups. Add a few different food coloring to each cup to make bright colors. If “paint” thickens, add a few drops of water.