Have fun preparing multicultural holiday treats!

Description:
Holiday cooking means forgetting about fat and calories and pulling out all the stops. Opportunities for fun in the kitchen increase significantly this time of year, and kids really do love the smells and energy that emanate from the kitchen. There's a certain fulfillment that comes from giving a toddler license to mix ingredients in a bowl and then carry the cooking process through to the triumphant and tasty conclusion. A great idea for this festive time of year celebrating peace, love, friendship and brotherhood is to make international cookies. What better way to help us feel connected to the world around us.

Step-by-Step:
Christmas and Chanukah Cookies:
1. Use your favorite sugar cookie recipe, then cut the center out of your cookies with a holiday shape and fill the center with crushed hard candy. Six pointed stars and dreidels for Chanukah, or green trees for Christmas.
2. Bake as called for in the recipe with a layer of crushed candy filling the cut-out shape. You can also place an oven-safe cookie cutter on a piece of aluminum foil, spray with non-stick cooking spray, and fill with a layer of hard candy.
3. Bake at 350 degrees for ten minutes and after the candy has melted and hardened, you can use the edible stained glass as an ornament.
Kwanzaa Cookies:
1. Frost rectangular shaped sugar cookies with three stripes: red, black and green to resemble the bendera, a flag created to honor African-Americans.

Materials:
Sugar cookie recipe
Crushed hard candy
A plastic knife
Cookie sheet
Cookie cutters
Aluminum foil
Non-stick spray
Frosting