For the Love of Cookies

ST. PATRICK LEPRECHAUN COOKIES

March 21, 2023March 19, 2023sallybr2 Comments

This cute set was made after a tutorial from Shirlyn (you can find her info here). I consider this an advanced project, in which consistency of the Royal icing must be as close to perfect as possible. You will also need to make Royal icing transfers with quite a bit of detail, and finally use diluted gel dye to do shading on the transfers and the fully set icing. It is a labor of love, but as usual, I learned a lot from my boo-boos.

There they are, four little guys, one pretty happy with his huge beer… Judging by his smile, it was not his first! The cookies have many details that make them shine. Below I go through some of the steps to make them, all very well-explained in her video tutorials. It all starts with making the transfers and allowing them to set overnight. The basic design is added to each cookie (I used a mini-projector for that), and icing in 5 colors is prepared, each in the correct consistency for the job. Shirlyn uses a single consistency for piping and flooding, and that is the way to get more lift on the icing, but it requires quite a bit of skill to ensure a smooth surface. My icing was perhaps a little too thick in some cases.

The trickiest part for me were the hands. Shirlyn makes perfect fingers, I just could not do it like hers, but maybe next time it will be better. It is the kind details that requires the icing to be EXACTLY right. Mine was too thick, I diluted a bit and it got too thin right away. But I know people who get the cookies won’t be inspecting each little component of it.

My favorite guy is this one, I just adore all the little details!

Online cookie tutorials are a great way to improve your cookie skills, and I love that I can just have the videos available whenever is most convenient for me. If you don’t own the cookie cutters, you can always cut by hand using the images she provides. Just make sure your rolled out dough is VERY cold, preferably frozen and removed from the freezer for 5 minutes to get it just right.

ONE YEAR AGO: Tunde’s Needlepoint Cookies, Two Ways

TUNDE’S PLAYFUL EASTER COOKIES

March 17, 2023March 15, 2023sallybrLeave a comment

To join Tunde’s Cookie Club, visit her site with a click here.

Talk about an adorable set of cookies that would make any kid (or adult) smile? This is definitely it. Not terribly complicated to make, but challenging enough to make you feel accomplished once they are done. You will need a plaque cookie cutter (preferably large), a bunny, a large butterfly and a 6-petal flower cutter.

Starting with my favorite…

What a sweet, elegant cookie Tunde designed here! You make it in stages, the center part gets flooded and covered with sanding sugar first. Then the flooding on the adjacent area, once that sets, the details are incorporated. Tunde piped the roses with Royal icing in her tutorial, I went with fondant, and piped only the leaves. I just love this cookie so much!

These flowers open up a world of possible designs. I flooded the cookies the day before, then just needed white Royal icing in piping consistency and a tip #2. Fondant flowers for the centers.

How cute are those bunnies? You tell me! Very simple to decorate, flood, cover with sanding sugar and add the details. Once again I used fondant flowers and piped the leaves with icing. I had the eyes from a project last year, and put them to use for these babies, as Royal icing transfers. It’s always a good idea to save leftover transfers, you never know when they can come in handy.

The butterfly used brush embroidery, and I feel I could have done a better job, but I am still happy with it. The whole set goes so well together, it screams Easter and Spring!

Tunde, thank you so much for this super fun adventure! You style is so unique, and your videos are perfect for anyone to follow…

ONE YEAR AGO: Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

MARLYN’S INSPIRATION FOR MARCH

March 14, 2023March 12, 2023sallybrLeave a comment

For this month, Marlyn proposed that we paint the dough with white before baking, to get the crackled white effect. That’s it. I went to work and made a few designs, with Spring in mind. What do you think?

The whole idea is to use AMERICOLOR WHITE to paint the dough before baking. I bake my cookies from frozen, so I paint them right after cutting, and then freeze. I had one additional design attempted – brush embroidery over the crackled base. That did to go well, maybe it explains why I have never seen it around…

All designs were simple, requiring just white or pink piping consistency icing for the details. The cherry blossom tree was a little more involved, as I used three tones of pink, brown for the tree, and had to pipe the dots in stages so they would not all join together. Still, pretty simple to put together.

Simple 6 petal flowers using a design inspired by Tunde Dugantsi (a blog post about it will come soon, stay tuned), and small butterflies.

Crackled base is another method to decorate that minimizes icing, and it is so easy. In theory, cookie dough with more leavening agent will originate a more dramatic look. My chocolate dough has no leavening at all, so the effect is subtle. Your kitchen, your rules!

Marlyn, I look forward to your next challenge! They are absolutely wonderful and help me a lot…

ONE YEAR AGO: Bear with Me

MOLDED COOKIES

March 11, 2023March 9, 2023sallybrLeave a comment

A small collection of cookies from the past few weeks, all using molds, either made of wood or silicone. Most of them I’ve had for a very long time, but you can find a lot available at etsy.com. Just search for fondant or cookie molds, or springerle molds and grab what screams your name. The advantage of molded cookies is that they need no icing. Painting is also optional but how can I avoid so much fun?

FLORALS

Normally I use this type of molds for Springerle cookies, but this time I just made sugar cookies flavored with hazelnut and orange. They were painted with luster powder + vodka.

BEE IN LOVE

These were painted with Sugarprism and the details of the hive painted with gold. Some steps shown below…

ELEPHANT LOVE

I just adore this mold (from Gingerhaus), a bit hard to find, it is now unavailable again. I had been flirting with it for the longest time, checking the store at etsy, until one day I got lucky and there were a couple for sale. It works well with any type of cookie, in this case I used strawberry flavored cookie dough with a touch of red dye. Details with luster gold and a spray with PME pearl. But even plain they are quite adorable, in my opinion.

I HEART YOU

Chocolate Dough + luster powders &vodka. Mold available here.

Super simple, just a brush with gold over naked chocolate cookies.

Silicone molds sold for fondant, but also work well to mold cookies, if your recipe is firm enough ad has no leavening agent, as the mold haste many details.

SPRINGERLE STYLE

Molds are a lot of fun to play with, and make decorating so easy. Even plain the cookies will look great.
I hope you could find some inspiration in this post.

ONE YEAR AGO: Four Little Chicks

A FESTIVAL OF HEARTS

March 7, 2023March 2, 2023sallybr2 Comments

HAPPY 23rd ANNIVERSARY TO ME AND MY FOREVER HUSBAND!

February is over but love is not. Truth is, I ran out of time to share all the heart-shaped cookies that materialized in my kitchen in the past few weeks, so sit back and get some ideas for romance in cookie shape. Below each design just a few details of how they were made.

THE CLASSICS

Red, pink and white. Simple. Wet-on-wet, some with a modern, playful twist.

GOLD

Flooded dark brown, stencil + air-brush gold. Or naked cookie painted with luster gold + vodka.

PINK AND GOLD

Flooded pink, with brush embroidery edge, stencil + air-brush gold and fondant detail.

SUPER PINK

Simple solid flooding, or minimal icing with piping consistency details.

GOLFER’S LOVE

Flooded in white, air-brushed in green and blue, fondant detail.

MARLYN’S BEACH LOVE

From a recent tutorial (click here to watch it), a few details of the design after the picture.

Sand detail first, covered with gold sanding sugar. Three colors of blue + brush embroidery and fondant detail.

AMBER’S BLUE HEARTS

Simple flooding in two colors, brush embroidery with lighter blue. For tutorial, click here.

For these cookies I used strawberry-flavored cookie dough, with a touch of red dye.

That’s all for now, friends! As you may have noticed, I tend to make heart-shaped cookies often, so you won’t have to wait until February to see more… I hope you found something to inspire you when that romantic mood sets in…

ONE YEAR AGO: Montreal Confections and PYOC

MARCH GNOME AND FLORAL COMBO

March 4, 2023March 3, 2023sallybr1 Comment

It is time to bring a new design by Amy from @seriouslysweet, in her cool series of matching gnome with flowers. In perfect tune with the month of March, here are my babies! Visit her site to join the fun, and get access to all the gnome-florals of 2023, past and future.

So many details in these cookies! I am particularly smitten by the shoes – what a clever way to make them! Same mold as the clover leaf, but cut in individual pieces and dyed black. And the a little golden coin on top. Kill me with cuteness, Amy! The other amazing detail is the beard, and finally the piping of the white roses branching down from the floral composition. Super cool. Below you see some of the steps in the preparation of this set.

All things considered, this is not a difficult cookie to make, and as Amy said in her tutorial video, it goes really fast, especially if you make the fondant pieces in advance. Not that many colors involved either, in fact for the gnome you only need black, green, and then a little terracota in thick consistency for the beard. The trickiest part was piping the white spiky bits to make the flowers, my hand was hurting a bit. But it was worth it!

Can you tell how much I loved this little project?

Amy, I look forward to what April will bring!

ONE YEAR AGO: From Christmas to Spring

PLAYING WITH CHOCOLATE ROYAL ICING

February 28, 2023February 26, 2023sallybr2 Comments

Chocolate Royal icing is a departure on the regular, white type, made by replacing some of the powdered sugar with cocoa powder. I used the recipe published in Amber’s new cookbook (which I recently reviewed here). If you don’t have the book, you can always use recipes found online. Cocoa powder contains up to 22% fat in its composition, so it can be tricky to use in items that are normally very low in fat. Macarons and Royal icing are two examples. I ended up ordering a special cocoa powder that is fat-free (available here) and it worked a lot better. The icing was smooth, dried without bubbles, and behaved a lot like regular white icing. Works amazingly well for macarons also, but that is another story to be told another time… Chocolate Icing has intense flavor and a beautiful brown color. One of the simplest ways to dress it up is coupling it with a stencil and gold air-brushing.

You can also use the air-brushed image to take it one step further and pipe the design to lift the image…

Going one step further, wait until the piping is fully set (preferably overnight) and then have some fun painting. Sugarprism is the ideal product because you can blend the colors very easily and it has excellent coverage, even on a dark background. For this technique, I followed the idea of Michelle, inventor of Sugarprism, in one of her many wonderful Facebook videos.

Opinions were a bit divided on these cookies. Some people loved the painted look, others preferred the more austere piping without colors. But everybody thought gold goes very well with the dark cocoa background, and I fully agree…

If you have never used Chocolate icing, consider doing so. It is a great alternative when all you need is a solid background, plus it adds a nice chocolate flavor to your base cookie.

ONE YEAR AGO: For the Love of Ukraine

HANIELA’S LOVE STATUE COOKIES

February 25, 2023February 25, 2023sallybr1 Comment

To learn all you need about these cookies, check this post from Hani’s blog.

If you are skeptical about Royal icing transfers, these cookies will convince you that they are a great way to embellish many designs. Haniela provides the template so you can pipe the LOVE motif either over parchment, wax paper, or acetate. I usually go for acetate, but in this particular case they worked better when I used parchment paper. They peeled off easier, I had several piped over acetate break. One important thing is to pipe them “puffy” – you need Royal icing with good structure, otherwise they will be way too fragile. Check the pink at the lower right to see what I mean. Outline first so you can get more to food inside and stay contained.

You can choose any color to pipe and also leave the transfer plain, or cover with sanding sugar. The ones in the bottom left I sprayed with pink luster from Wilton, and that gave an interesting tone over the gray letters. Once the transfers are fully set (I recommend patience and waiting overnight), all you need to do is flood a basic square cookie and place the designs on top, I made an extra cookie with brush embroidery as a companion to the love set. I really like the combination of gray with tulip red.

These transfers are very delicate, so my advice is to make a few more than you will need. And also make sure your base cookie is large enough to accommodate the transfer. I felt I played with danger a bit, mine were almost too small…

The bead border is of course optional, but if you follow this little blog of mine, you know that I am quite fond of them… You can find a lot to inspire you online as far as written messages go. Just pick what is calling your name, and have fun with it!

Before I leave, a note on red food color. Often red has a bitter after taste. One way to avoid that is using “Tulip Red” from Americolor. It is made from a different type of pigment and does not have any taste. It also colors well, so you won’t need to use half a bottle to get the red you want.

ONE YEAR AGO: Cardinals in a Tree, a Pizza Box Set

HUGS AND KISSES

February 19, 2023February 16, 2023sallybrLeave a comment

By now it is pretty clear I am not ready to drop the love theme… This set of cookies were demonstrated in a tutorial by Andi Kirkegaard. You can get all details and join her classes visiting her website with a click here. I have followed her classes before, these florals were favorites of my past. Once again, because those are part of a paid tutorial, I cannot share details or templates, but once you sign up, you will receive quite a bit of material to work from: cookie and icing recipes if you need them, and super detailed instructions as to how much icing to make in each of the needed consistencies. It is not a beginner’s level project, but if you have some experience decorating cookies and working with Royal icing, you will do great.

The full set involved 4 cookies, but I did not do a good job on cookie #4, so I am highlighting the other three. Many details and techniques are involved in the making of these cookies, you will be playing with piping consistency of very fine lines, and a very cool method to make the balloons with a puffy shape. You will also use a stencil, and air-brushing. A mini-projector, although not absolutely necessary, will be quite helpful. Some of the steps are shown below.

Andi is a very experienced instructor, and she will have you work on one particular cookie, then move to another one as the first sets, so it is all quite efficient. I cannot pick a favorite, I loved making this cute trio…

THE BALLOONS…

You will learn how to pipe the balloon component in stages to create lift in the icing. Fine lines will make the basket weave, but of course you could adapt using some other method – perhaps the same technique used for the wood in the kissing booth could work here. Or even use a stencil instead of piping.

THE LOVE JAR

So many details, but don’t you love the look? I think my favorite touch was the air brushing dark at the bottom and getting lighter as you move up on the jar. Just adorable! Maybe this was the simplest of the four in the set.

THE KISSING BOOTH

Well, this was maybe my favorite, after all… Lots of little details make this cookie shine, including the work with Royal icing to give the impression of wood. It was the most time-consuming cookie to make but also quite a lot of fun to see it materializing, little by little.

As to the cookie I could not make very well, here it is… I did not get the writing to work, so it would have been better to just make the background with the stencil, and the ruffled edge. But it is nice to try something challenging. I hope to do a better job next time.

This set of cookies, coupled with some simple hearts would be nice to offer as a special gift, don’t you think?

ONE YEAR AGO: Of Bears and Bunnies in Love