The Cookie Cutter Project - Cinnamon Squirrels

In case you can’t tell, they’re holding pieces of walnuts in their little cookie arms.

I was in the mood for cinnamon.  And we’ve had our little squirrel friends stopping by for seeds and scraps of toast and stale bread a lot this winter, so I thought I’d use the squirrel cookie cutter for these.

I know – it’s supposed to be a project with my kids.  But Sunday was a day of ice fishing and quilting, and we didn’t get the cookies baked.

So I baked them yesterday before everyone got home.

I’d made the dough on Sunday, so all I had to do was let it warm up a bit, then roll it out and decorate it and bake it.

To add the nuts, I took broken pieces of walnuts, set them on a little piece of dough and pressed that onto each squirrel’s arm.  Then I sprinkled a mixture of granulated sugar, sparkling sugar and cinnamon over the squirrels and nuts.

Very simple.

Then I got the clever idea to take pictures of the squirrels OUTSIDE, as the snow was falling.  And hey!  I should make a cup of hot cocoa, too!  And the steam can rise off the cup and look cool in contrast to the falling snow!  And the cookies…well, they can just be cute.

But how to make the cookies stand up? I don’t want to sit them in the snow because they’ll get soggy.

So I poured birdseed in a bowl, because you know, squirrels often sit in bowls of birdseed, so it would be REALISTIC!

I know.

It makes little sense.

But I didn’t care!

I made hot cocoa, poured it in a teacup that had been part of a set my grandmother had, sprinkled stale mini marshmallows on it and carried that, my bowl of squirrels and seeds, and my camera out into the snow, trying not so slosh hot cocoa on my leg.

Here’s the one picture I took with the cup of cocoa:

Then I thought – this is just TOO ridiculous.  It looks like squirrels in a boat sailing through the arctic and encountering…what…a giant teacup with giant stale mini marshmallows in it?

Yes, that happens frequently in the wild.

So I moved the cup and focused on the squirrels in their crystal boat of seeds.

Ah, much more believable.

The Three Wise Squirrels, bringing gifts of walnuts, walnuts, and walnuts as they sail through a desert of snow in a Princess House oval crystal dish weighed down with your basic songbird blend of bird seed, on their way to the cup of marshmallows.

This is how my brain works.

Anyway, if you want to make cinnamon squirrels and take silly pictures of them in the snow, JUST LIKE I DID, here’s the recipe.

(It’s a small batch.  I only had one stick of unsalted butter when I made the dough, so the other ingredients had to be adjusted accordingly.  I made about 2 dozen squirrels.)

Here’s the recipe:

Cinnamon Squirrels

Ingredients:

1 stick unsalted butter, room temperature

2 oz sugar

6 oz flour

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Optional – nuts, cinnamon sugar mixture

What to do:

Cream together the butter and sugar. 

Whisk together flour and cinnamon.

Add flour mixture to butter/sugar mixture and mix until just combined.

Wrap dough in plastic and refrigerate about an hour.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Roll out dough and cut out your cookies.  If you don’t have squirrel cutters, feel free to use any other woodland creature.  Or not.

Press pieces of nuts into small balls of dough and attach to squirrel arms, or just press into cookies, if you want to use nuts.  If you don’t want nuts, then ignore this part.

Sprinkle, if desired, with cinnamon sugar.

Bake about 12-15 minutes.

Eat some while you can, because once the hungry hordes return from work/school, there won’t be any left.

Comments

[yummychunklet]

Cute! I especially like the photo in the snow with the mug of marshmallow covered cocoa.

[Kat]

Here's where my brain went upon seeing the squirrels bringing walnuts to the marshmallow party:
"I carried a watermelon."
"Carried a watermelon?"

[Alana D]

Those are too cute!!

[Emily]

Just for the record, this is exactly why I love you, and want to be just like you. :)

[Angela]

These will be perfect to help cheer on the St Louis Cardinals with little Rally Squirrels, thanks for the recipe. Mine will be holding little baseballs instead of nuts!