Inspiration: On a random Saturday morning, whilst puttering around the house, I had The Food Network playing in the background and on popped the show Girl Meets Farm. Now, I must admit, I wasn’t paying particular attention to Molly Yeh….Until she started talking about making tie-dye cookies.

That perked my ears right up.

Watching her method, I decided they looked pretty easy, so I gave them a go.

From the Office of Me to You: Choose your food coloring gels with care. Otherwise, you’ll end up with a dull and potentially colorless bake!

Whereupon I learned not all gel food coloring brands are created equal. In the pic above, the basic cookie color was initially green. However, the organic dye I used disappeared entirely during the bake. An outcome the manufacturers failed to mention might happen on the back of the box.

I then discovered that the purple, produced by a different company, would fade a bit if the oven temperature exceeded 350 degrees. Prewarned, I added loads more food coloring than I usually would to counter the fading – as these cookies bake at 375 degrees.

(And usually is a relative term here, as this is the first time I’ve worked with food dyes in…..Well, the last time I can recall was in grade school for a rainbow cake for a carnival cake walk. I’m sure I’ve used it since then, but darned if I can remember when.)

The orange, the only non-natural dye of the lot, turned out perfectly.

In any case, as an eggless cookie, they turned out okay. I think these are better when eaten warm. And they are HUGE, which my taste testers found off-putting. So next time, rather than eyeballing the amount of dough in each cookie (as instructed), I will weigh each piece of colored dough and cut the size by half.

Christie: I can see these cookies being a popular holiday treat in the early days of Christie’s detectives’ careers. As eggs, amongst many other kitchen staples, were rationed during and after the Great Wars.