fossil biscuits

 M is talking about dinosaurs in her room at pre school so I thought this would be a fun way to extend on that and teach both kids a bit about fossils. This idea came from the Martha Stewart website http://www.marthastewart.com/

Ingredients

• 1 cup walnuts, toasted
• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
• Salt
• 2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
• 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons confectioners' sugar ( is that caster sugar?)
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Pulse walnuts in a food processor until finely ground. Transfer to a bowl, and whisk in flour and 1/2 teaspoon salt.
2. Beat butter, sugar, and vanilla with a mixer on high speed until pale and fluffy. Reduce speed to low. Gradually beat in walnut mixture.
3. Divide dough into eighteen 1 1/2-inch balls, and press into irregular stone shapes using the palm of your hand; transfer to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Dust food-safe plastic insects with flour to coat; press into dough to make fossil impressions. Freeze until dough is very firm, 20 to 30 minutes.
4. Bake until golden brown and firm in center, 25 to 28 minutes. Transfer sheet to a wire rack, and let cool.

You make the biscuit dough, shape it into balls, flatten the balls slightly with your hand and then press ( clean and floured) little plastic animals into them to make a shape.

The recipe doesn't say what temperature to bake them at so I went for 180o C. They didn't come out as well as Martha's did ( even after a full hour in the freezer) but we had fun and they taste nice. ITou caould even argue that they're healthy-ish since they have walnuts in them : ). I'm thinking if you follow the recipe you're bound to get better results than I did as I'm not a baker and we have a terrible oven that just decides if it's going to be too hot or not hot enough depending on what you're trying to cook!

one of our best- a scorpion

Martha's fossil biscuits- she's clearly an expert at making them : )