The Chick Cookies in Shortcrust Shell are the second episode of the new series “Crafting in the Kitchen”, where I propose easy crafts, which I will then transform into recipes. I hope you like it and that it can inspire new ideas not only in the kitchen! Two cute and fun proposals to prepare with children for Easter or Easter Monday.

Difficulty: Easy
Cost: Cheap
Rest time: 1 Hour
Preparation time: 40 Minutes
Portions: 3 chicks
Cooking methods: Oven
Cuisine: Italian
Seasonality: All seasons

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
1 egg
5 tbsp butter
3 teaspoons powdered sugar
1 tsp red food coloring (liquid)
9 meringues
to taste unsweetened cocoa powder
1 food coloring (orange pencil)
1 food coloring (green pencil)
to taste glucose syrup (as adhesive for meringues)

Steps

For the preparation, you can follow the steps found here. For convenience, I leave you the main ones below: work on a pastry board flour, egg, sugar, and butter. Knead until you get a smooth dough, place it in the fridge for about half an hour wrapped in cling film.
Draw the outline of the upper egg shell and the lower egg shell with the chick peeking out on parchment paper. The egg dimensions are about 5 inches in height and 4 inches in width.
Divide the shortcrust pastry into two parts, roll it to about 1/4 inch in height. Place the paper molds on top and cut the outlines with a sharp knife.
With these quantities, I made three eggs; with the leftover shortcrust pastry, you can create flower cookies and leaves. Make small holes in the two halves of the shell, as shown in the figure, with the tip of the knife, which will be useful later to open the egg. Place in the freezer for about half an hour (even an hour if you have time)
Once the cookies are removed from the freezer, bake them for about 12-15 minutes in the oven at 350°F.
To decorate them, I mixed liquid red food coloring with powdered sugar, it should result in an easy-to-spread mixture. I applied the color with a pastry brush. For the eyes, I added a drop of water to a bit of cocoa powder, while for the beak and crest I used an orange food pencil.
To finish decorating each chick, I added three small colored meringues (I attached them with a little glucose) and a leaf I made with the leftover pastry, colored with a green food pencil. As a pin in the holes, I used a piece of toothpick, but you can also use kitchen string.