Parshat Tzav (and Vayikra): Cow Cookies

I know I didn’t post a parsha project last week–but I did do one, really! Last week’s parsha and this week’s are about korbanot, or the animal and meal offerings.

Last week we made whole wheat cookies (a meal offering), and this week, more cookies. We talked about the parsha and the Thanksgiving Offering, which involved so much food that had to be eaten in a such short amount of time, that lots of people had to be invited to share in eating it. Then we talked about sharing and mishloach manot.

But, here is how to make the cookies:

Divide your cookie dough, leaving 3/4 of the dough vanilla flavored, and add cocoa powder to the remainder to make it chocolate (about 1 Tbl. for a dough made with 2 cups of flour). Roll out both dough 1/8″ thick.

Then tear the chocolate dough into small, irregular pieces and lay them over the white dough in a random pattern. Use the rolling pin to gently press in the chocolate dough and make a cow pattern:

Now, you just cut out cows (you will get at least two dozen from a cookie recipe with 2 cups of flour):

Bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes. You could use chocolate to add eyes before or after baking.

Cow Cookies

1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. baking powder
7-9 ounces flour (about 1 1/2 cups to 2 cups flour)

1 Tbl. cocoa powder

Beat sugar, oil, egg, and vanilla for ten minutes. Add the baking powder. Stir in 1 1/2 cups of the flour. Add more as needed. It will be a bit hard to use up all the flour, but you could. The dough should be soft, but not sticky. Take 1/4 of the dough and add in the cocoa powder (or more, if a darker color is desired). Knead the cocoa powder in until the dough is an even chocolate color.

Roll out the dough 1/8″ thick as described above.  Cut and bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes, until lightly golden at the edges.

You can use the dough for hamantaschen, too.

Tags: cookies, Parsha Cakes, Parsha Projects, Parshat Tzav