Strawberry and Vanilla Pinwheel Cookies

Coconut Layer Cake Murder

## Ingredients

* 1 cup white ***(granulated)*** sugar
* 1 cup ***(2 sticks, 8 ounces, ½ pound)*** salted butter, softened
* 1 large egg
* ½ teaspoon salt
* ½ teaspoon baking powder
* ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
* 2 and ½ cups all-purpose flour ***(scoop it up and level it off with a table knife—don't pack it down in the cup)***
* 3 Tablespoons strawberry jam
* 1 teaspoon strawberry extract
* 1 teaspoon red food coloring
* ⅛ cup ***(2 Tablespoons)*** all-purpose flour ***(that's in addition to the flour you used earlier)***
* Confectioners ***(powdered)*** sugar for rolling out the dough

**Hannah's 1st Note: This recipe calls for liquid food coloring. If you use gel food coloring, you won't need as much because the color is much more concentrated. Just watch the color of the dough when you mix it and stop adding when you think it's bright enough.**

## Directions

* DO NOT preheat oven. Cookie dough must chill before baking.

**Hannah's 2nd Note: Mixing this dough is easy with an electric mixer, but you can also do it by hand.**

* Place the sugar in a large mixing bowl.
* Add the softened butter and mix until it's light and fluffy.
* Add the egg and beat until the resulting mixture is a uniform color.
* Sprinkle in the salt and the baking powder. Mix until they're thoroughly incorporated.
* Add the vanilla extract. Mix it in thoroughly.
* Add the flour by half-cup increments, mixing after each addition. Continue to beat for another inute after the last half-cup of flour has been added and mixed in.
* Scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl, take it out of the mixer, and set it on your kitchen counter.
* Give the dough a final stir by hand with a mixing spoon.
* Tear off a sheet of wax paper that's about 2 feet long.
* Wet a kitchen sponge and wring it out in the sink.
* Use the sponge to moisten the spot you've chosen to roll out your cookie dough.
* Quickly spread out the wax paper, curled side down so it straightens out, on top of the moist spot on the counter.
* Tear off another sheet of wax paper of the same size.
* Moisten a strip about 2 inches into the bottom ***(or top)*** edge of the wax paper already on the counter. You will need to use a second sheet of wax paper and overlap it on top of the first sheet.
* Moisten the area to the bare counter where you want to place the second sheet.
* Spread out the second sheet, curved side down, on your counter.

**Hannah's 3rd Note: The reason for moistening the counter is to keep the wax paper from sliding around as you roll out your cookie dough. If you have a bread board in your kitchen, you can skip all the instructions for moistening the counter and using the wax paper. Simply get out your bread board and place it on the counter.**

* Dust the wax paper ***(or the bread board)*** with powdered sugar and spread it out evenly with the palm of your incredibly clean hand.
* Remove HALF of the cookie dough from your mixing bowl and place it on the wax paper. ***(Just guestimate half. No one will complain if it's not precisely half.)***
* Form the cookie dough into a ball and then pat it like piecrust with your hands.
* Dust the top of your flatten cookie dough with more powdered sugar and spread it out with your hands.
* With a rolling pin, roll the dough into a rectangle that is approximately ¼-inch thick.
* Cover the vanilla cookie dough with wax paper.
* Roll the dough up into a loose roll.
* Place the loose roll in a Ziploc plastic bag, seal it, and put it in your refrigerator.

***You're through with the vanilla part of your cookie dough for the present. Now it's time to mix up and roll out the strawberry part of your cookie dough.***

* Place approximately 3 Tablespoons of strawberry jam in a microwave-safe bowl. ***(You don't have to be exact at this point.)***
* Leave the jam jar on the counter.
* Heat the bowl of jam on HIGH for 10 seconds.
* Check the bowl with the jam. If there's 1 Tablespoon of liquid, you have enough. If there's not, add more jam to your bowl and melt that for 10 seconds in the microwave. ***(The object is to get 1 full Tablespoon of jam liquid.)***
* Once the melted jam has produced 1 full Tablespoon of jam liquid, add it to the vanilla dough in your mixer bowl, put it back in the mixer, and turn the mixer on LOW speed.
* There will be some solid parts of the jam left in the small bowl you used. Add them to the jar of strawberry jam, stir them in, put the lid on the jar, and put it in the refrigerator.
* With the mixer running on LOW speed, add the strawberry extract to the bowl. Mix it in thoroughly.
* Again with the mixer still running on LOW, add the red food coloring to your bowl. Mix that in thoroughly.
* Add the ⅛ cup of all-purpose flour and mix that in.
* Once the dough is thoroughly mixed, shut off the mixer, scrape down the sides of the bowl, and take it out the mixer.
* Give the strawberry dough a final stir by hand with a mixing spoon.
* Repeat the instructions for preparing the counter for rolling out the dough.
* Remove the strawberry cookie dough from the mixing bowl and form it into a ball.
* Pat the dough ball down like piecrust, dust it with powdered sugar, and use the rolling pin to roll out another rectangle that is approximately ¼ inch thick.
* Cover the strawberry dough with wax paper.
* Roll the strawberry cookie dough into a loose roll, place the roll in a Ziploc plastic bag, seal the bag, and put it in the refrigerator next to the vanilla dough ball.
* Chill both halves of your pinwheel cookie dough for at least 2 hours.
* After your cookie dough has chilled for 2 hours, tear off another sheet of wax paper and spread it out on the counter. If you're using a bread board, spread the wax paper out on the bread board. You will use this piece of wax paper to wrap up your pinwheel dough roll once the vanilla and strawberry cookie dough are combined.
* Dust the wax paper ***(or the bread board)*** with powdered sugar. This will hold the cookie roll you're about to make.
* Carefully, try to unroll just a bit of the vanilla roll. If the dough breaks off, it's still too cold to unroll. Let it warm in your kitchen for another 10 to 15 minutes and then try again.
* When the vanilla dough is warm enough to unroll, unroll it.
* Carefully, peel off the top sheet of wax paper.
* Now unroll the strawberry dough.
* Peel the top sheet of wax paper from the strawberry roll.

**Hannah's 4th Note: You will now have 2 unrolled sheets of cookie dough, the vanilla and the strawberry, stretched out side by side on your kitchen counter.**

***Here comes the tricky part***

* Grasping the strawberry dough by the corners of its wax paper, carefully slide it so that the long side of the strawberry dough rectangle is right next to the long side of the vanilla dough rectangle.
* Still grasping the corners of the wax paper, flip the strawberry dough over on top of the vanilla dough so that the strawberry dough is nestled on top of the other with no wax paper between them.

***Okay, THAT was the hard part. The rest is easy.***

* If the edges of the dough are uneven, trim them with a sharp knife. Use the pieces of dough you've trimmed for patches if there are any holes.
* Working from the long side of the rectangle, use your impeccably clean hands to roll up the dough so that the dough forms a nice, tight log. This will create a spiral pattern when you slice the log into cookies.
* When your cookie dough log is rolled, rub it with powdered sugar, turning it so the entire outside surface of the log is coated with the sugar.
* Tear off another, longer sheet of wax paper. Roll your cookie dough log up in the wax paper. Twist the ends to keep the roll from coming undone.
* Place the roll in a Ziploc plastic bag, seal the bag, and set it on a piece of cardboard or a flat tray. Then place it in the refrigerator for another 2 hours. ***(Overnight is fine, too.)***

**Hannah's 5th Note: At this point, you can even freeze the spiral cookie dough bag. Just place it, wax paper and all, into a large Ziploc freezer bag. It will keep in the freezer for a month or two. The day before you're planning to bake your cookies, take the roll out of the freezer and thaw it in the refrigerator overnight. Then all you have to do is cut it int cookies and bake it.**

* When 2 hours have passed, preheat your oven to 350°F, rack in the middle position.
* Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper or spray it with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray.
* If your cookie log has flattened in the refrigerator, leave it in the wax paper and simply roll it around a bit to the counter to round it out.
* Using a sharp knife, cut ¼-inch slices from the cookie dough log. Cut only as many cookies as you can bake at one time.
* Place the Strawberry and Vanilla Pinwheel Cookies on the prepared cookie sheet, 12 to a standard-size sheet.
* Once you've filled your cookie sheet, return the cookie dough log to the refrigerator.
* Bake the cookies at 350°F for 8 to 10 minutes or until the vanilla part of the cookie turns slightly golden.
* Remove the cookies from the oven and cool them on the cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then remove them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Yield: 4 to 6 dozen pretty and tasty cookies that everyone will love.

**Hannah's 6th Note: These are more work than most cookies, but they're well worth the effort. When you bring out a platter filled with Strawberry and Vanilla Pinwheel Cookies, your guests will love the way they look and taste.**