Heavenly Hearts

Great for parties and gifts

This Highland Shortbread cookie recipe is generations old. It's perfect for cutting into hearts. Double the batch, stack the cookies on top of each other with icing between, and write a romantic message on a slip of paper. Put the slip between the two cookies so it sticks out a little. Perfect for that special someone! It's a great activity for sleepover parties too! Enjoy

You'll need:

1/2 stick of butter
1/3 cup of sugar
1 1/2 oz. Cream cheese (or 1/2 of a 3oz.pkg.
1 egg
1 tsp. flavoring (vanilla, rum or lemon)
1 1/2 cups of flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking powder
To Make It:

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

2. Get a big bowl. Cream the butter, sugar and cream cheese together until the mixture is really fluffy.

3. Then, beat the egg up with a fork in a cup. Add the egg and your flavoring to your cream cheese and sugar mixture. Beat everything together until it's mixed.

4. Pour the flour, salt and baking powder together into another bowl. Mix them up together really good.

5. Slowly combine the flour mixture with the egg mixture. When it's all mixed together, you've got dough!

6. Put a couple of spoons of flour on a cutting board. That's so your dough won't stick. Then roll out your dough and use a cookie cutter to cut your cookies. You can also drop the dough by the tablespoon.

7. Put your cut or dropped cookies onto a greased baking sheet. Bake them at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes. You can frost them if you want too. But they're so rich all by themselves that you don't have to do that unless you want to.

Submitted by Angela, 12, California