TO MAKE THE COOKIE
Preheat oven to 350°, with rack in the center.
Soften butter in electric stand mixer with paddle attachment. Add Sugar Cookie Mix and egg and mix until dough comes together. Dough will wrap around paddle when done.
Lay a piece of parchment paper on work surface. Put the entire ball of dough onto the paper. Use your hands like you are playing with playdough to flatten and shape the dough into an egg shape; it does not have to be thin yet because you will roll it out. Place another piece of parchment paper on top. Roll dough evenly with a rolling pin, rolling from the center out to the edges, being careful to keep an even thickness while maintaining the egg shape. Peel off the top layer of parchment paper to release it from the dough, lay it back down on top of dough again, and then flip the whole package over. Peel off the new top layer of parchment paper to release it from dough, lay it back down on top, and roll dough again as before, until it forms an egg cookie about 12 inches tall and 9 inches across at the widest spot. Remove top layer of parchment paper. If dough is thinner at the edges than in the middle of the cookie, thicken the edges by using your fingers and the side of your hand to gently push edges back toward center.
Once you have shaped your egg, it is ready to bake. Leave cookie on parchment paper and transfer paper to a large baking sheet. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes until edges are light brown.
Transfer parchment paper with cookie still on it to a rack; let cookie cool completely before decorating. Once cool, keep cookie on the parchment paper to decorate with Vanilla Royal Icing (recipe follows); this makes cleaning up easy.
TO MAKE THE ICING
In bowl of electric stand mixer with whisk attachment, whisk together Vanilla Frosting Mix and cream of tartar. Add egg whites and mix on high until icing thickens and stiff peaks form. Add 2 tablespoons water and mix again. You need a consistency that will spread slightly, but is not runny. Add more water to thin, or more Vanilla Frosting Mix to thicken, one teaspoon at a time, if needed.
TO DECORATE THE COOKIE
For base coat of icing, put half of the icing into a separate bowl and color as desired with food coloring. Put this icing in a disposable pastry bag, snip about ¼ inch from tip, and squeeze a thin line of icing around the top edge of cookie, leaving room for it to spread a bit without going over the edge; this will form a dam for the rest of the icing. Let the outline harden before filling in with remaining base coat. Snip off just a little more from the tip of the pastry bag and squeeze icing in concentric circles to fill in the rest of the egg. It is okay to leave small bare spots on the cookie as the icing will flow into itself to make a uniform smooth surface. Set cookie aside in a warm, dry, undisturbed spot until icing dries and hardens; this may take a couple of hours.
Take this opportunity to check the consistency of the remaining icing, adding more water or Vanilla Frosting Mix one teaspoon at a time as needed to thin or thicken, until desired consistency for decorating is reached. Distribute the rest of the icing into small bowls and mix with different colors as desired. Fill small pastry bags with the different colors. Cut the smallest amount off the tip of the pastry bag and practice the design pattern you have in mind on a piece of parchment. Adjust tip size as needed to achieve the design you want.
Set aside to completely dry and harden before transferring to a plate.
NOTE
If you prefer to use a template to cut out egg shape, draw a 12-inch-high egg on a piece of parchment paper, fold the egg in half vertically, and trace the side of the egg that looks the best onto the second side so egg is symmetrical. Cut out the egg shape from the parchment paper. When cookie dough is rolled and ready to cut, place the paper egg pattern over the dough and cut around it with a small sharp knife. Remove scraps of dough from around egg and proceed with rest of recipe as directed above.
To make your cookie look more like an egg, make your stripes of icing curve like happy smiles across the base coat of icing instead of going straight across. This will give the look of a three-dimensional egg.
© Pamela's Products, Inc.
