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Easter Basket Cookies
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5 from 10 votes

Easter Basket Cookies - Easy and Adorable

Just in time for Easter - decorate sugar cookies baked in an egg shape to look like adorable easter baskets!
Prep Time10 minutes
Cook Time12 minutes
Decorating Time30 minutes
Total Time52 minutes
Course: Cookies, Easter
Cuisine: American
Servings: 20 Easter Basket Cookies
Calories: 217kcal

Ingredients

Sugar Cookies

  • 1 cup (8 ounces) unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 1 cup (7 ounces) granulated sugar
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 Tablespoon milk
  • ¾ teaspoon baking soda
  • ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
  • 3 cups (15 ounces) all-purpose flour
  • Confectioners' sugar for rolling out the cookie dough

Easter Basket Cookies

  • 1 recipe for sugar cookies, cut into 4-inch egg shapes (See Tip 1 and 6)
  • Pink, white, and green decorator frosting (See Tip 2)
  • Pastel colored M&Ms (See Tip 3)

Instructions

Sugar Cookies

  • Place butter and sugar in a large bowl; beat until light in color. Add egg and milk and beat to combine. Add baking soda and salt; beat until combined. Gradually add flour; beat on low just until the dough comes together. Divide the dough in half, wrap in waxed paper, and refrigerate for 2 hours. 
  • Preheat oven to 375º F. Sprinkle the surface where you will roll out dough with confectioners' sugar.
  • Remove 1 wrapped pack of dough from the refrigerator at a time and place it on the prepared surface. Sprinkle the top with confectioners' sugar and cover with parchment paper. Roll out dough to ¼-inch thick. Move the dough around and check underneath frequently to make sure it is not sticking. If the dough has warmed during rolling, place a cold cookie sheet on top for 10 minutes to chill. Cut with a 4-inch egg-shaped cookie cutter. Place at least 1 inch apart on a parchment or silicone-lined baking mat.
  • Bake at 375°F for 11 to 12 minutes or until cookies are just beginning to turn brown around the edges. As soon as cookies come out of the oven, shape by cutting with a 4-inch egg-shaped cookie cutter. Yield: 20 egg-shaped sugar cookies.

Easter Basket Cookies

  • Use the above recipe or your own sugar cookie recipe. Bake sugar cookies, cut into egg shapes with a 4-inch cookie cutter according to the recipe directions. As soon as the cookies are removed from the oven, re-shape them by cutting with a 4-inch cookie cutter. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. (See Tip 4)
  • Smooth the edges of cookies by "filing" on a wire mesh strainer. (See Tip 5)
  • Fill a piping bag with white or pink decorator icing fitted with a coupler. Starting with the #5 round tip, pipe a horizontal line in the middle of the cookie. Pipe a vertical line from the center, close to the edge. Pipe 4 or 5 spaced horizontal lines across the vertical line. Pipe another vertical line. Pipe horizontal lines, creating a basket weave. Continue until the basket weave is formed.
  • Replace the #5 tip with a #18 star tip. Pipe basket handle with individual stars.
  • Fill a piping bag with green decorator icing fitted with a coupler and the #233 grass tip. Pipe grass in the basket. Finish by placing pastel-colored M&Ms in the grass.
  • Yield: 20 Easter Basket Cookies

Video

Notes

  1. If your sugar cookie dough is sticky, you'll want to dust your surface to prevent sticking. I use confectioners' sugar to do this rather than using flour. The reason is that I don't want to incorporate any more flour into the dough. The confectioners' sugar does as good a job as the flour in mitigating the sticking.
  2. I used store-bought decorator frosting to decorate these Easter Basket Cookies. However, you could also use homemade buttercream frosting tinted with gel food coloring.
  3. I've tried using pastel-colored M&M peanuts. However, I thought that they were too big. Regular M&Ms tend to work better.
  4. Invariably, the cookies will spread some during baking. Therefore, as soon as they come out of the oven, I take the cookie cutter and cut the still-soft cookies to return them to their original size and shape.
  5. The downside to cutting the baked cookies is that their edges are no longer smooth. Therefore, I "sand" the edges using a wire mesh strainer. When Susan and I took a baking class in Paris, this was the technique used to produce smooth edges to the baked tart shells.

Nutrition

Calories: 217kcal | Carbohydrates: 28g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 11g | Saturated Fat: 7g | Trans Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 35mg | Sodium: 79mg | Potassium: 27mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 13g | Vitamin A: 310IU | Vitamin C: 1mg | Calcium: 14mg | Iron: 1mg