| 1 | Preparation time: 2 hours cooking time: 15 to 20 minutes |
| 2 | Heat oven to 325 degrees. |
| 3 | Have ready ungreased baking sheets. |
| 4 | Beat butter in large bowl of electric mixer until light and fluffy. |
| 5 | Beat in half of the flour, the sugar, vanilla and water until thoroughly combined. |
| 6 | Beat in the remaining flour. |
| 7 | Use a scant 1 tablespoon of dough and press it flat and thin with your hands. |
| 8 | Put a chocolate mint wafer in the center and fold the dough over to completely cover each chocolate and to form a neat, rectangular package. |
| 9 | Pinch the edges to seal. |
| 10 | Place 1 inch apart on ungreased baking sheets. |
| 11 | Bake until bottoms are lightly browned, 15 to 20 minutes. |
| 12 | Cool a few minutes on the baking sheets and then cool completely on wire racks. |
| 13 | For icing, mix confectioners" sugar and milk to make a thin icing; color icing as desired. |
| 14 | Use a small spatula to ice cookies. |
| 15 | Decorate as desired so cookies resemble christmas packages. |
| 16 | for variety, second-place winner carol feezell of skokie, illinois uses several kinds of miniature candies in her pretty cookies. |
| 17 | She suggests filling the cookies with chocolate mint wafers, such as andes, or hershey"s miniatures. |
| 18 | We also enjoyed lindt"s orange chocolate thins when we made the cookies in the tribune test kitchen |
