Saint Patrick's Day Cookies.

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Rosie knows a few leprachauns she wants to make
a little something special for on Saint Patrick's Day.

So I'm making a batch of shamrock cookies.
I recently purchased a set of shamrock cookie cutters
and needed a recipe for a cookie-cutter cookie,
so I Googled away and came up with this recipe:

Cookie Dough
2 3/4 cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 sticks butter, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 egg 1 tsp vanilla
Combine dry ingredients. Beat butter until light. Gradually beat in sugar until light and fluffy. Now here, the recipe said to:
Beat in eggs. Plural. Hmmm.
Beat in vanilla. Knead and form into a ball. Halve the ball and, working on a lightly floured surface, roll out each each half to about a 12-inch diameter and 1/8 inch thick. Cut out cookies and place on ungreased baking sheet. Bake about 6-7 minutes, until lightly browned. I went ahead and used the one egg, and it didn't work. So, I'm showing you how to fix something that looks really really wrong and turn in into something really really right.

Here's my mise en place.
With only one egg.
I think the recipe had a typo.
Also, whenever I'm baking,
I have my ingredients at room temperature,
unless, of course, the recipe calls for chilled butter.
If I'm in a hurry,
I'll put my eggs in hot tap water to get them to room temperature.

Now, I'm giving you the step by steps
of the procedure here,
showing you what what wrong
I never throw a dough or batter out.
I fix it.
It might not end up how it was supposed to,
but it will be edible and, a lot of times,
better than the original recipe.

First, I creamed the butter and slowly beat in the sugar.

Add in the egg.

Vanilla in.

Mix in the flour, baking powder, and salt until incorporated.

This is a mess.
I'm supposed to have a cohesive ball here,
like pie dough.
It's too dry.

Next the directions called to half the "ball."

I turned the crumbly, shaggy mess
onto a cutting board,
tried to push it all together as best I could,
and when I tried to cut it,
it totally fell apart in crumbs all over the board.

Soooooo,
how to fix?

I beat another egg with enough vegetable oil
to make 1/3 cup of liquid
and I worked it in with my hands ...

... until I had a nice pliable dough.

Roll out on a lightly floured board,
dusting with flour as needed and flipping.
About a 12-inch diameter and 1/8-inch thickness.

Cut out with shamrock cutters.
Were I to do this again,
I wouldn't use the small cutter.
There were three in the set.
Next time, I'll use the medium and large
because decorating the small ones is a pain in the butt.

These went into a 400 degree,
not for 6-7 minutes per the recipe,
but for 20 minutes.
Leave in the pans for a few minutes,
and transfer to a rack while still warm.

While the cookies were cooling,
I started on the icing.

Icing for piping:
2 1/2 cups powdered sugar
3 TB water
2 TB butter
1 TB light corn syrup
1 tsp vanilla
Mix all together.

Separate the icing.
Put a little less than 1/2 into a pastry bag
fitted with a small piping tip.

Icing for glaze:
Add in a few drops of green food coloring
to the rest of the piping icing,
until you get the desired shade of green. I also added a little bit more water
to get a thinner, more spreadable consistency. I painted my cookies green, using an offset spatula,
then went around the edges with the white piping
to outline the shamrocks.
Decorate with silver dragees and sprinkles.

Isn't it pretty?

And I'll tell you something I learned:
Piping is NOT my forte
and I don't get any better with practice.

Green M & Ms.

Hmmmm.
Wonder who's getting these.