This fun and easy to make cookie recipe is ideal for parents and kids to bake together. Children with egg allergies can make these no egg cookies. The recipe is simple, requiring only four ingredients and no electric mixer.
The honey shortbread cookies are crisp and firm, keeping their shapes instead of spreading out while being baked. They also hold up well under heavy handling. Children can ice and decorate cookies without the cookies crumbling to bits.
Make Baking with Kids an Educational Activity
While children practice following directions to make the recipe, parents can use the suggestions below to initiate a discussion about where the ingredients come from, how they compare to each other, and how they look, taste, feel, and smell.
Honey Shortbread Cookie Recipe
- 2 1/2 cups flour
- sprinkle of salt
- 1/2 cup salted butter (left out for 1 hour to soften to room temperature)
- 1/2 cup honey
Directions:
- Help children measure 2 1/2 cups of flour into a mixing bowl.
- Let children sprinkle and mix a little salt into the bowl. Have children taste a pinch of flour and a pinch of salt. Discuss how the color, feel, smell, and taste of flour and salt are alike and different. Discuss where flour and salt come from.
- Let children place the butter in the bowl. Discuss where butter comes from. Have children touch and taste the butter wrapper. Discuss how the color, feel, smell, and taste of butter compare to those of the other ingredients.
- Have children squeeze the ingredients together, mixing them with their fingers until the mix is the texture of cornmeal. While children mix the ingredients, discuss how the look and feel of the mix is changing.
- Have children taste a drop of honey and compare it to the other ingredients. Discuss where honey comes from. Then have kids dribble in a bit of honey at a time and keep squeezing and kneading the mix in the bowl until it is thoroughly mixed into one big lump. (Try not to overwork the dough.)
- Cover the dough with plastic wrap and place it in the refrigerator for at least an hour to chill.
- Dough will be crumbly and stiff when it comes out of the refrigerator. Parents should squeeze and knead it gently until it can be rolled out 1/4-inch thick on a lightly floured surface. Depending on how well-developed children's fine-motor skills are, either adults or kids can roll the dough out with a lightly floured rolling pin.
- Let children cut shapes out of the dough with metal cookie cutters. If dough seems fragile or flaky, parents can be in charge of transferring the cookies to a cookie sheet that has been lightly floured or covered with parchment or wax paper.
- Bake cookies at 350º in a preheated oven for 12 minutes. Let them cool for 5–10 minutes on a cookie sheet before transferring them to a cookie rack to cool completely.
Baking with Children – Teach Preschoolers Shapes
When baking with kids who are younger, have children press the dough into a rectangular or round cake pan. Before baking, score the shortbread into rectangles or squares (if in a rectangular pan) or triangular pieces (if in a round pan). Discuss the smaller shapes into which each larger shape can be divided.
Baking with Kids – Practice Measuring Skills
When baking with children who are older, experiment with ways to flavor the dough. For example, add a tablespoon of lemon zest, a teaspoon of vanilla, or 2 teaspoons of other spices like cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, allspice, lavender, or even pumpkin spice (add these ingredients in before the butter).
Baking with children is a fun way for kids and parents to spend quality, educational time together. Make sure young chefs have proper kids' baking tools, and then try this recipe out with some fun spring baking activities like making Easter egg puzzle cookies or a bunny hutch cookie house.
Renee Carver - Renée Carver has an Elementary Education degree and over ten years of experience writing and editing children's educational products.
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