Owloween Biscuits

Name: Owloween Biscuits
Yield: 12
Ingredients: 130 g butter; 90 g icing sugar; 1 tsp vanilla essence; ½ tsp almond extract; ml Arla Cravendale Semi-skimmed milk; 1 egg yolk (Large); 230 g plain flour (Plus extra to sprinkle on your dough); 50 g coconut flakes (Desiccated); 240 g White Royal Icing if you would like to fill the entire owl (homemade or shop bought); Black Writing Icing; small chocolate buttons; Whole Almonds

Get ready for Halloween with these spooky but extremely tasty Owloween biscuits! Make sure to serve them with a cold glass of Cravendale!

Ingredients

Butter	130 g
Icing sugar	90 g
Vanilla essence	1 tsp
Almond extract	½ tsp
Arla Cravendale Semi-skimmed milk	ml
Egg yolk (Large)	1
Plain flour (Plus extra to sprinkle on your dough)	230 g
Coconut flakes (Desiccated)	50 g

To Decorate

White Royal Icing if you would like to fill the entire owl (homemade or shop bought)	240 g
Black Writing Icing
Small chocolate buttons
Whole Almonds

Instructions

Step 1

Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4 and line two baking trays with baking paper.

Step 2

With a wooden spoon, beat your icing sugar and butter together until well combined, light and fluffy.

Step 3

Beat in the vanilla extract, almond extract, Cravendale milk and egg yolk until fully mixed.

Step 4

Sift your flour into the bowl, add your coconut flakes and then mix with a wooden spoon (you will need to use your hands). A soft dough should form which you can then shape into a ball, wrap in cling film and chill for 30-40 minutes.

Step 5

Once chilled, sprinkle your dough with a little flour. Lay the dough between two sheets of baking paper and then use a rolling pin to roll out to about 0.5cm.

Step 6

Remove the top baking sheet and then use an owl cutter/round cutter to stamp into your rolled out dough. If using a round cutter, simply free-hand cut into a tulip shape or, cut the tulip shape out of a piece of card and then use the card as a template to cut around for ease. The top should resemble that of a three-pronged crown and the sides should curve in a little and then out in a hour-glass like shape.

Step 7

Once your shapes are cut, use a knife to cut a 2cm high by 1cm width gap at the bottom, centre of your owl. This is the gap needed to allow your snowy owls to perch on the rim of your glass.

Step 8

Using a palette knife, or a cake slice, gently lift your shapes and lay in the baking trays with a 2cm space in-between each.

Step 9

Bake for 10 minutes and then leave to cool on a rack for ten minutes. Your biscuits need to be completely cooled before decorating.

Step 10

To decorate, spoon your pre-made white icing into a piping bag that has a small nozzle, draw an outline all around the outside of your biscuit and then fill inside - if you do not have a lot of white icing simply use the white icing to create an outline only. Take your black icing and draw a thin oval on the left and again on the right sides of your owl - these are the wings. Use the black icing again to draw little 'v' shapes across the 'stomach' of your owl - these are the feathers. Using the yellow icing, draw and fill two circles top-centre of your owl- these are the eyes. Then add a chocolate drop to the centre of each yellow circle. Directly underneath and centre of the eyes, blob a little white icing and then stick an almond facing vertically on top- this is your owls nose.