Mars Bar Groundhogs

Groundhog Day is February 2^nd  – that is this coming Thursday.  According to legend, when the groundhog comes out of its burrow, there will be six more weeks of winter weather if it sees his shadow.  If he does not see his shadow, there will be an early spring.

When you live in a cold climate, predicting the end of winter is a never-ending discussion. 

So I made these Mars Bar Groundhogs and you can too.

Here is how I did it.

Materials Needed for Decorating:

- mini Mars bars

- a few melted chocolate chips

- mini M&M’s – brown for the ears & cheeks

- royal icing eyes

- Wilton Jumbo Confetti Sprinkles – pink for the nose

- royal icing

- chocolate brownie cookies – circle cookie cutters

Instructions and Tips:

To Make the groundhogs.

“Glue” the EARS (mini M&M’s) to the mini Mars bars using a dab of melted chocolate chips.

Use royal icing to attach the eyes, pink nose and cheeks.

Make the teeth with royal icing.

Truth is you can simply stop here.  Use a bamboo skewer and plant the groundhogs in a planter. 

I made round chocolate brownie cookies – two solid and three hollowed out for each groundhog burrow.  I glued the cookies together bottom two are solid and top three are hollowed out.  Filled the cookies with more icing and stuck in the groundhog.

It’s a good activity for the weekend.  If you make them let me know how they turn out.

So far we have not had much of a winter in Toronto.  But I still would not be too unhappy the groundhogs don’t see there shadow and we get an extra early spring.

Happy Groundhogs Day!

Reindeer Noses - Last Minute Idea

I have always had a soft spot for Rudolph.  Not sure if it was because all of the other reindeer used to laugh and call him names (those other reindeer were really like mean girls) or because he was just so darn adorable – red nose and all!  I think these cookies provide a nice tribute to Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer and are pretty cute too.  And the best part is that they are super simple.

I know everyone is scrambling for last minute holiday “stuff”, so this easy peasy idea is sure to bring a smile to many -- including you because, did I mention, simple, easy and relatively effortless?

Using whatever size circle cookie cutter, bake 9 round cookies.  Just so you don’t waste precious baking time trying to figure out all of the other reindeer names they are: 1. Dasher 2. Dancer 3. Prancer 4. Vixen 5. Comet 6. Cupid 7. Donner and 7. Blitzen.  I made the Rudolph noses out of sugar cookies with red icing and red decorative sugar and all of the other reindeer (you know the mean ones;) out of my chocolate sugar cookie recipe.  I actually also made these all out of sugar cookies of which 8 were decorated with brown icing and brown sugar and because it was so popular I also did them in plain gingerbread.  So your choice – the gingerbread and chocolate sugar cookies do not need to be decorated at all.

This is a fun, kid friendly baking idea even on a foggy Christmas day (which is what the weather outside in Toronto looks like right now).

Let me know if you make these -- send me a note or better a picture –- I love seeing how your creations work out.  Happy baking!  And, in this case if you sing along, that is perfectly acceptable.

Ladybug, Ladybug...

Ladybugs are so darn cute -- they are little, fly and are polka dotted -- really what more could you want?  So I made a bunch of these to package up for clients -- its a perfect hostess gift.


I used my chocolate brownie cookie recipe for these cutie bugs.  I think this recipe is best for smaller cookies because they are so moist so larger cookies could be too heavy and break.

Roll out the dough.  I got this cookie cutter from Copper Gifts.  The cookies are about 1.5" x 1.5" and a perfect bite size that is still big enough to decorate reasonably

Materials Needed for Decorating:

• royal icing -- I cannot stress enough how much I love the royal icing when made with Ateco meringue powder
• piping bag
• piping bottle for flooding the cookies and the dots
• gel colours of your choice -- I used red, black but I think these would be cute in pink too
• white non-perils
• black AmeriColour Gourmet Writer
• tweezers

1.  In black, outline wings and put a line down the middle.
2.  Pipe the head and add two white non-perils for the eyes.
3.  Flood the wings with red.




4.  Add black polka dots with a thinned out black icing (I think pink heart sprinkles could also look fun) and a small dot on the eyeballs with an edible marker.

I think these turned out CUTE AS A BUG and hope you do too!

Frosting for the Cause -- Breathe, Chocolate Brownie, “OM” Cookies

I'm so excited because today I am a guest baker / blogger on Frosting for a Cause. 

It's a wonderful site with new creative, tasty baking ideas everyday, and best of all, it raises funds for and awareness of the fight against breast cancer.  

At some point today, please take a moment to look at the site and please try to remember to "breathe".

Super Bowl, Love & Chocolate - A February Trio

I really know NOTHING about Football but I know the Super Bowl is a BIG deal (or, depending on your intonation, big DEAL) and it is on Sunday February 6, 2011.


People throw parties on Super Bowl Sunday -- and where there are parties, there needs to be cookies. So, I made these chocolate sugar cookies in the shape of footballs and hearts to appease all football fanatics and their loved ones -- because everyone knows that the way to someone's heart, who is totally disinterested in football, is with chocolate.  And, the best part is that these cookies totally taste like brownies.

1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tablespoon milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2/3 cup all-purpose flour


Preheat oven to 375.
Beat together butter, brown sugar, cocoa powder, milk and vanilla until well combined.
Beat in baking soda and flour.
Shape dough in a ball.
Roll out on cocoa and flour mixture (just a bit so the dough does not stick to the work surface).
Shape and bake for 5 minutes.

The footballs are not super huge, and while I am a super fan of the big sugar cookie, I still think these are a nice sized cookie.  The recipe is not very big but can be doubled (and I don't say that about very many recipes).

To decorate I used royal icing, a #6 tip for the football ends and a #3 tip for the laces.

I really liked the way the cookies came out and bagged up with 12 perfectly yummy brownie football cookies in a bag.

But I realized they needed a bit more love so I added in a chocolate heart with white frosting and pink & red heart sprinkles -- because really LIFE IS BETTER WITH SPRINKLES!

However you spend February 6 or 14 or any day in February for that matter, try to include some love & chocolate to warm up this otherwise cold and dreary month.  It just dawned on me that that is perhaps why the Super Bowl and Valentine's Day are in February.

And, while the Super Bowl and Valentine's Day seem far away, they really are just around the corner, so if you are interested in ordering cookies, send me a quick note to arrange.

Don't forget to sign up to follow Flour Child on Facebook  -- not that I have really figured out what that means 100% but I do have a site that is working.  I think you can even sign up on the blog and all comments are welcome!