Lemon Drizzle Crumble Cookies

Corr blimey, this last few weeks has been hectic.  Not as hectic as some (I send out many congratulations to some of my fellow bloggers who just became mums.  You guys know who you are!) but it's been busy enough to leave it waaaay to late to cook, take decent pictures on my rubbish camera (of which only takes good photos when the light in my kitchen is natural) and post about it.

Seriously, can't wait till Kris brings home his decent photo taking equipment.

So these cookies.

They were actually a project for kid friendly baking as I've been babysitting my friends little 3 year old a lot lately.  I actually put the question out to some of my friends "What do I do to keep her occupied?!"  And every answer that came back was "Bake with her!"

Luckily, I had more than enough supplies to do that.  Lots of decorating stock, pretty cake cases, funny shape cutters and brightly coloured mixing bowls.  Made me look at my house from a kids point of view.  It's paradise.

Of course, our cookies didn't come out as perfectionist neat as these bad boys I'm about to show you (I tried out my fantastic Joseph Joseph rolling pin with the measure caps on the end for these ones) but they still were pretty tasty, so I decided to do a grown up version, with a little more flavour, as we had family coming over, and nothing is nicer to come into that the smell of baking & a warm plate of cookies in front of you.

Plus, they are cheap and cheerful to make.  Exactly what I need a week before payday with a slowly emptying fridge & pantry.

There's no special instructions on these ladies and gents, they are simple as simple can be.  Which, personally, I think is good now and again.  The texture is a little like shortbread, but softer.  The lemon rind just adds something chewy and sweet into the cookies - yum!

I used a fairly small cutter, just the one up from the smallest in my set - I think it's a 2 inch cutter, but obviously any shapes will do as you can tell by the pretty stars stamped on top.  Be creative, and if you're making these with little ones, icing pens were my savior.

Reduce the cooking time if you've cut out smaller shapes like these stars, they literally brown up quicker than anything!

Enjoy!  I better get back to work before it overtakes me again!