Rainbow cookies

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Youtube released the list of their most viewed videos for 2010 recently.

Alastair hadn’t seen the double rainbow one yet so we watched it together. And look, if you haven’t seen it – just watch it. It’s hilarious in an awful, cringey, embarrassing, uncomfortable way.

My favourite line: What does this mean??? (It means that sun is shining on drops of water. Ahem.)

While I laughed at it, I do appreciate the sentiment behind it, because rainbows are fantastic. Kermit asked: why are there so many songs about rainbows? It’s because they’re fucking amazing, Kermit!

International Incident Colour Party

This is supposed to segue neatly into the theme of the last International Incident Party for the year, but unfortunately I seem to have made a hash of it. The theme is colours, and I took that theme and ran with it… to… rainbows. I made cookies! Rainbow cookies! (Us Australians normally call cookies biscuits, but there is NO WAY a cookie that looks like a rainbow should be called a biscuit).

Oh look, I got there in the end.

As I was saying, the theme for this month is colours, and what’s more colourful than a rainbow? These cookies were so much fun to make! I doubled the fun by dragging out the Playdoh to do a “test run” to make sure that my idea would work. The cookies were made from a basic cookie recipe, that I added vanilla and cinnamon to. The dough was separated into five sections of dough that was then coloured and then layered around each other in a log. When sliced the cookies looked like rainbows! I did think about making each colour a different flavour, but decided to keep it simple for my first go.

I was surprised at how good the cookies tasted since the dough was so incredibly easy to put together. They were similar to shortbread, though not quite as buttery and crumbly, and with a hint of cinnamon. They were also very moreish and it was really hard to only eat one. I think I ate about five cookies on the day I baked them!

These cookies would be great for a kid’s party… or just for people who love rainbows. I’m sure double rainbow guy would appreciate them. Whoa, it’s so intense!

Now that we’ve had fun with rainbows, don’t forget to check out the colourful creations of the other attendees:

Rainbow cookies

Adapted from a recipe for Refrigerator cookies from AWW Bake

250g butter, softened
1 cup (160g) icing sugar, sifted
2 & 1/2 cups (375g) plain flour, sifted
1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
1 teaspoon cinnamon (you can leave this out if you just want plain vanilla cookies)
5 different gel paste colours

Beat the butter and sugar in an electric mixer until it’s pale and fluffy. Stir in the flour in two batches.

Scrape the dough on to a floured surface and knead until smooth.

You should have roughly 775g of cookie dough. This will need to be divided into five portions and coloured. My colours were red, yellow, green, blue and purple. Set up five bowls and divide the dough into the following weights:

Red: 55g
Yellow: 105g
Green: 155g
Blue: 205g
Purple: 255g

Colour the dough in each bowl by adding in a few drops of gel paste colour and kneading until the colour is mixed through. Start with a few drops and keep adding colour until you’re happy with the intensity.

When all the dough has been coloured, take the smallest amount of dough (red in my case) and roll into a thin log. Take the next dough (yellow) and flatten it, then roll it around the red dough in a half moon shape. Repeat with all the remaining colours. Wrap in clingflim and refrigerate for about an hour, or until firm.

Preheat oven to 180°C and line oven trays with baking apper.

Cut the rolls into 1cm slices and place the cookies on to the trays about 2cm aprt. Bake for about 10 minutes. Let them cool on the trays for 10 minutes and then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.