candy cane cookies

My goodness, 6 days since I've posted here.  That is how I know life is busy, but then again, it always is at the holidays.  Not to mention DH was out of town last week, 2 of my boys were sick, and we were very over scheduled for some reason.  Anywho, I'm starting with what I made today because it is fresh on my mind, and I still have the tab up on my computer.  It was my turn to teach pre-school and we are doing letter J for Jesus - going with a Christmas theme.  So I decided to read the book the Legend of the Candy Cane and have candy cane shaped cookies for a snack.  (I so have to buy that book - I had to borrow it today.)
I found a recipe on allrecipes.com.  I ended up adding a 1/2 cup flour, but I'm not sure I'd do it again.  (This is a very unsure.  I felt the dough could stand to be a bit stickier so that it wouldn't crack, but I also wouldn't want it to stick to the counter.  Also, I loved the texture of these, kind of a cross between a sugar cookie and one of those Mexican Wedding cookies.  I really liked the texture.  BUT, I also added a few drops of water to my white half.  The red half was just about perfect with the red food coloring I added because I used the liquid kind. -part of the reason I went with the extra flour in the first place.)  Soo, that all being said, next time, I'll have a personal toss up with whether or not to add the extra flour.  I may try it once without, or I may be chicken and want and exact repeat.  Time will tell.  OK, on to how I made them before kids get home from school and I have to get meat in a marinade before I teach piano lessons...

Note on pictures - see the difference between twisting individual cords(top cookie) and rolling the to cords into 1 2 colored cord and twisting the 1 cord (the rest of the cookies.)

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 cup butter flavor crisco
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 1/2 teaspoons almond extract
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 cups flour (see note above to decide whether to go with less or not.)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt (I didn't measure, original had more, but I just poured an amount in my hand that looked good and tossed it in.)
• red food coloring

Directions

1. Mix butter and crisco together until smooth.  Add powdered sugar and mix until smooth.  Add egg and extracts and mix until smooth. (Or just add it all at once and beat.  I just like to do it separately for some reason.)
2. Add flour and salt and mix until a dough forms.
3. Divide dough in half.  Set 1/2 of of dough aside.  Add red food coloring to desired shade in 1/2 of the dough and mix until combined.  
4. Roll out dough into 4" "snakes" (so said my 2 year old - he thought we were playing with playdough this morning.)  (I actually rolled 2 really long snakes set them side by side and cut them in 4 inch lengths.)  Take your 2 4 inch snakes and roll together into 1 fat snake that is 1/2 red and 1/2 white.  Twist the snake and curve the top over to make a candy cane shape.
5. Bake at 375 for 9-10 minutes.  (Mine took 10.)

Other notes:  If making J's, make sure to make them face the right direction.  My instinct is to make a candycane go the other way.  Also, I did a bit of trial and error on the rolling.  Originally I started just twisting the 2 strands together, but then I remembered reading a post on Allrecipes.com that said to roll them together.  I tried that and it was way better.  The cookies didn't crack as much.  (see picture for difference in appearance.)

A final note - if you want to add  peppermint flavor, either exchange the almond extract for peppermint or add crushed peppermint candies to the top of the cookies by brushing with heated corn syrup (10-20 seconds in the microwave) and sprinkling on top.  I loved them the way they were, but I'm not a peppermint fan.