gnomes

FEBRUARY GNOME & FLORAL ADVENTURE

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HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY!

Remember my previous post on this subject? It is time to bring a new design by Amy from @seriouslysweet, one more online tutorial completed. At the risk of repeating myself, I have to say these were loads of fun to make! I had to make the floral version twice, because at first I did not have the correct fondant mold to make the hearts. I thought the design was a bit compromised, and looked much better with the correct mold.

You know what I love the most about them? The gloved hands… those were made with fondant but Amy also said we could pipe with Royal icing on the cookie or even do a Royal icing transfer. But the fondant has the perfect texture and allows for that little sculpting, the extra touch. In typical Amy’s fashion, the cookies involved many different techniques, including my favorite (used for the beard). For this set, I used the heart molds I had around, and they were a bit too small. Not for the gnome, I thought those were ok, but definitely for the floral.

The hearts were a little lost in the middle of the greenery and roses (those by the way are called cabbage roses and super easy to pipe).

As soon as the right mold was delivered to our door (thank you, amazon.com), I re-made them… On my second time around I used a Strawberry Sugar Cookie Dough which I am quite in love with. I will at some point blog about it with the full recipe.

I love the way the new floral looks, the hearts are very prominent and plump, just like Amy designed them to be…

I think one cannot have too many gnomes in a cookie blog. That’s why I am already excited for the month of March, who knows what Amy will come up with next?

To join her adventures online, visit her site and come on play with us!

ONE YEAR AGO: Gingerbread Heart Cookies (one of my favorites ever!)

DON’T CALL THE GNOME POLICE!

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Is there such a thing? Could I be in serious blogging trouble for publishing two gnome posts in a row? Let’s hope not, because today I want you to meet Pippin, The Gnome. Design and tutorial by Amy from Seriously Sweet on Davis St (click here for her IG page).

This was part of a “simple” online class taught by Amy… I say “simple” because there were only two cookies, and not much preparation required for class. We only had to make a few fondant pieces and paint them, nothing else. In fact, Amy told us we could do them early in the morning as the class was around 4pm. A few colors of Royal icing – not that many – and some in very small amounts. A real “no big deal” event, right? Right? Well, let me tell you, I went into a few cycles of hyperventilation during the adventure. Have you noticed Pippin is showing his feet and hands? It turns out that we were asked to pipe his fingers and toes. Please be kind and don’t go carefully checking how many fingers in each hand. Pippin has a genetic condition, but it is a minor thing and he lives a happy and fulfilled life.

So here is our countertop right before class started, all pieces of fondant painted, cookies baked, and Royal icing colors ready in bags.

It all starts by drawing the overall placement of all the cookie’s features. Then the hat is made with pieces of fondant (I used modeling chocolate instead), rolled into small ribbons and then sculpted with a clay tool. Amy had a pretty clever way to make the very top, but I could not quite do it like she demonstrated…

By far the trickiest part was piping the fingers and toes, all made in stages so they would not all glue together. Pippin is not a frog, so please, no webbed feet. I loved the detail of Pippin’s nose, which is made with a tiny shell painted gold.

The second cookie of the set was a sandcastle, quite a bit simpler. We did the whole thing during class, speeding things up with a dehydrator. That cookie would probably go well in a beginner’s class, whereas I consider the gnome as advanced. Too many things can go wrong.

Painting the hat was left for the following day so that the fondant(or modeling chocolate) was fully set. We used dry dusting with many shades of luster powder, super fun!

The level of detail in this project was something! I don’t know now Amy can think of so many little bells and whistles to add to her productions, but I am glad she does, and also explains so well how we can do the same. The shading done to turn the feet a little dirty was brilliant!

I close this post with all the cookies I made that afternoon, which had a beach-summer feel…

Amy, thank you one more time for yet another great adventure,
you always push my limits, and I LOVE IT!

ONE YEAR AGO: Hungarian Folk Art Cookies

OF GNOMES AND UNICORNS

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To open the month of February, I bring two mythical creatures I am quite fond of. The gnomes were adaptations from a recent tutorial during a Facebook live with Hani (click here to watch, it starts at 21 minutes). The unicorn was my own design, using a stencil made with Cricut. I have a rocky relationship with my Cricut, he’s been mean to me a few times, and deeply hurt my feelings. But then, the unicorn happened, and we are in good terms again. Until next storm. Which may or may not be already brewing…

DESIGN #1
HANI’S GNOMES

These were designed by Haniela, she used a cute little envelope as decoration, made with royal icing transfers. I had some fondant hearts hanging around, and decided to put them to use. The noses are made with Royal icing transfers, or you can pipe after the base is set, which is what I did for the feet and hands.

His name is Felix…
He is the guardian of measuring spoons…

DESIGN #2
SALLY’S UNICORN

This is a large cookie, because I wanted to have enough space to pipe the design. After flooding in white and allowing the base to fully set, I used my stencil to air-brush in a sheen, light gold color, just to guide the piping.

Next, the lines were piped in gray using a Wilton 3 icing tip so that they would end up thick and form a solid margin to flood in colors later. The eyebrows were painted black with a food safe pen.

So here they are, my mythical little creatures ready to celebrate a season of love!