Sugar Cookies and Natural Dyes

Sugar Cookies
Please use organic ingredients.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 egg
2 cups all-purpose unbleached flour
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder, non-aluminum
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 tablespoon milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg until well blended. Add flour, baking powder, salt, milk and vanilla; mix until all combined. Refrigerate until cool; it makes for easier rolling. Roll out in your favorite shapes and bake for 8 minutes.
Let cool and frost. Use natural dyes, never artificial food colorings in your frosting.

Natural Dyes

To dye the Easter eggs the natural way, here’s what to do:

Put eggs in a single layer in a pan. Pour water in pan until the eggs are covered.

Add about a teaspoon of vinegar. Add the natural dye appropriate to the color you want your eggs to be. Bring water to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes.

Remove the substance you used to color the eggs. Put eggs in a bowl. If you want your eggs to be a darker shade, cover them with the dye and let them stand overnight in the refrigerator.

Pale Red: Fresh beets or cranberries, frozen raspberries

Orange: Yellow onion skins

Light yellow: Orange or lemon peels, carrot tops, celery seed or ground cumin

Yellow: Ground turmeric

Pale green: Spinach leaves

Green-gold: Yellow Delicious apple peels

Blue: Canned blueberries or red cabbage leaves

Beige to brown: Strong brewed coffee images-1

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