Two simple cookie designs, that give the King of the Jungle a fun and modern spin.
DESIGN #1
Don’t you love it when a cookie cutter helps you with the decoration? This adorable cutter is available at etsy (click here). Once you bake the cookie, the design is laid out for you. I used two colors of Royal icing, light gold in flooding consistency to cover the whole extension. Let that set, and used piping consistency for the details, in light brown. Next day I used a fine tip food pen to add the eyes, whiskers and mouth. Super simple, and I think the end result is pretty cute…
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DESIGN #2
I borrowed this design from the IG page of Kathy Barbro (artprojectsforkids). I used my mini-projector to draw the image on fully set iced cookie (white background). Then, I used a food pen for the face, and luster powder mixed with vodka for the sections around the lion’s head.
Once the painting was fully set, I went back over the lines with a slightly thicker tip food pen, for a more polished look.
I really love this design, and it is super easy to do. I imagine that most people can draw it free-hand, but as you may have noticed, I need all the help I can get. You can do the outside in two colors only, or even keep the whole thing black-and-white. But of course, I am slightly addicted to colors…
I’ve had my Cricut cutter since Christmas last year, a very thoughtful gift from my beloved husband. The learning curve to play with that baby is steep. So far I’ve mostly used stencils available online – many provided by Marlyn, from Montreal Confections, many from shops at etsy.com. In this post, I share with you my first adventure designing stencils myself. They were all super simple, using images available in the internet, and a straightforward cut. Stencils are great to design cookies for special occasions. This set was made for a potluck party we hosted recently for all Tesla owners in our town.
The simplest one was just the Tesla logo with the characteristic modern font. Once the image is found online, Cricut can size it to the desired cookie area. For that cookie, I flooded the base with red, let it set overnight, and spray painted with black. Since this is such a simple image, it is very important that the lines are sharp. I use a screen between the stencil and the air-brush to make sure no under-spray takes place. That takes a little practice, but now I feel a bit more confident using it. Some screens sold especially for cookies can be expensive. I am quite happy withthis one, that is large enough to cover any size stencil, and also more affordable.
For the second type of cookie, I went with a gray background and either black or red air-brushing of the stencil image.
Yet another image – also found with a search for Tesla clipart in google – used a gold background and brown air-brushing. And finally the classic image of Tesla Model X (the one we own) with the Falcon wings open. I made some silver, some black.
Just for variety, I made a set of charging stations using the mini-projector and food pen.
This was a fun set to plan and make. Stencils make it quite straightforward, comparing the time needed to make each of the charging station cookies, the ones with the stencil are ready in the blink of an eye!
You can get by ordering stencils online, but it will limit a lot what you can do. In many cases you can order a stencil in different sizes, but there is little flexibility. For instance, some might offer three sizes, small, medium, or large, and you will have to bake your cookies to fit those sizes. If you own a Cricut (or Silhouette), you can tweak stencils to your needs, and also make your own. I have a lot to learn still, and to be absolutely honest, I feel quite discouraged at times. But I guess that is expected when learning a new skill.
Yes, it is that time of the year, all we can think about in the cookie department is romance, hearts, reds and pinks. I have quite a few cookie ideas to share – as I followed several tutorials in the recent past – but today I launch this party with my own designs.
DESIGN #1 THE PUZZLED HEART
This cookie cutter was a gift from Tanya, my tent-baking friend. She used her 3D printer to bring it to life. Last year she made a stunning composition using it, and I decided to give it a try now. Several decorating methods were used: brush embroidery for the small heart off-center, texture with a fondant ball, wet-on-wet and air-brushing with stencil.
It is very important to use a recipe without any leavening agent when making a cookie puzzle in which the pieces should join together nicely after baking. I baked them slightly apart from each other, and used my default chocolate cookie recipe which has no baking powder. Once that is done, the decorating fun can begin. All the wet-on-wet and the brush embroidery can be finalized once the cookies are cold. The air-brushing requires many hours for setting the base, even better if you do it the following day. The texture is added about 30 minutes after flooding, but you must be gentle and carefully test it. You don’t want to break the skin, just form a nice rounded indentation. However, don’t worry if it cracks at certain spots, in the end it won’t be a problem.
DESIGN #2 MODERN HEARTS
I like this type of design because it is so exotic and unique. I used this set of cutter + stencil. Very high quality cutter, it comes with two stencils, I’ve only tried one of them so far. Cookies are flooded in different colors, then the pattern is air-brushed. All that’s left to do is pipe the design with a Wilton 3 tip, to get thick lines.
In a similar spirit, but with a free-hand approach, my duo of “Game of Thrones” inspired hearts…
I did not know exactly where I was going with them, but in the end, I loved the combination of gray and fuchsia. I flooded the cookies in white, piped a simple design, and then used luster powder + vodka to paint the different sections.
DESIGN #3 BRUSH EMBROIDERY
In this set I used chocolate cookies because I find that the brush embroidery looks particularly interesting with a dark background. Very easy to decorate, once you do the embroidery, just flood the center in any color of your choice, and add dots while still wet. I like to pipe dots of different sizes because then a random pattern looks nice. When the dots are all the same size, the spacing needs to be more carefully planned, as the ones below.
Same style in red and white, and a little departure using fine lines to make a lace ribbon in the center. After that the upper and lower regions are flooded with red. It is a bit more work, so making a dozen of those would be time consuming and tedious maybe. But I made only a couple, to practice the fine lines. I try to incorporate a design with fine lines in some of my weekly bakes.
Another style, super simple. Gray at the edges, white to flood the center, and when that sets a red food pen is used to make the red stitches. Easier than piping, but you can definitely pipe Royal icing if you prefer.
DESIGN #4 ZENTANGLES
Cannot stop making those at every change I get… They closed my latest post with the Gnomes, and now they show up again. The one above is my favorite Zentangle pattern because it is easy and fast to do, but it gives the impression of being labor-intensive.
Not quite zentangles, but in the same style of repetitive pattern…
DESIGN #5 LOVE MESSAGE
These were imagined by my beloved husband, and transformed into cookies by yours truly. It turns out that I have a little daily routine with Buck, our 14 year old Jack Russell: I hold him and keep telling him over and over… “I love you to pieces”. Phil thought it would be cool to make a little series celebrating different pets. I used a mini-projector for all except the kitten, which was – very bravely – drawn free-hand, from a cartoon I found online.
DESIGN #6 THE BAROQUE HEART
For this set of cookies, I used Cricut to cut a stencil exactly in the shape of the cookie. Then all that’s needed is flooding the base, allowing to to fully set, then air-brush the design. I used fuchsia from Sugarflair as the base, and air-brushed purple, which I also used later to make a beaded border. With PME tip #2.
The trickiest part is air-brushing. To minimize the possibility of smudging, I use a screen placed on top of the stencil, but that makes it hard to judge how well the dye is reaching the cookie. It is not very easy to get all cookies with exactly the same intensity of color, but maybe that’s part of their charm… never two exactly alike!
This closes the series of hearts I’ve made since the year started. In the next blog post, I will share versions made following tutorials online.
If you don’t know the meaning of zentangles and how I like to adapt them for cookies, read my previous post on the subject. Today I share a few more, and include my first adventure with Instagram reels showing how I make my very favorite kind because is is so simple and the end result always pleases me. The cookie can be left simple or further decorated with fondant, modeling chocolate, or Royal icing transfers. Below, fondant stars painted silver. Purple and silver, the colors of our university, in the zentangle way.
I like the intensity of the purple but this type of design works well in any color…
A second addition of the same pattern inside each little square changes it completely but it is still quite straightforward to do…
A variation on the same type of curved line…
And now for a few adventures on patterns and colors, some turned out the way I wanted, some I consider “work in progress”.
The one below is my representation of a brain with insomnia: busy with many thoughts, not necessarily connected…
Here’s looking at you, kid!
Whenever I make sugar cookies, I always make sure to flood a few with any color I have leftover. Then, all I have to do is choose a pattern out of the thousands available out there, or make a composite design. I love the zentangle path…
In life, as well as in cookies, it’s not always black and white…
But then again… sometimes it is…
All images drawn on Royal iced cookies allowed to fully set overnight, using a black food safe pen and mini-projector (AKASIO). Sprinkles, watercolor, luster powder with vodka to bring accents of color.
For first series with the sprinkles, I was inspired by a post I saw on Facebook a while ago, but unfortunately I did not save the precise link. It was one of those images that you see, fall in love with and when you try to retrieve it again… no luck. Wish I could give proper credit.
A great Mexican painter with a life-story plagued by serious health problems and chronic pain, she was famous for her self-portraits, all very colorful, showcasing her beautiful, profound eyes and dark hair. This post joins a few “Frida-cookies” I’ve made using two different methods: traditional Royal icing flooding and piping, or drawing with a mini-projector.
To cut the shapes I used this set from Sugarbelle. Those are very small – not quite 2 inches – perfect for those who just like a little taste of sweets, or as decoration details in cookie platters.
By joining two flowers with Frida’s head, the resulting cookie is about 3.5 x 2.2 inches, still small as far as cookies are concerned.
A very detailed tutorial can be found at Sugarbelle blog with a click here. I cannot lie to you, they were a lot more work than they seemed. Mainly because there are several colors. In addition to the flooding consistency you’ll need red, yellow and black in piping consistency (for the hair and roses), and green in stiff consistency (for the leaves). You will be dealing with a lot of piping bags and tips. But it was worth it! I really like the way they turned out.
Moving on, I used some of the countless images of Frida available in the internet to work with my mini-projector, after flooding the cookies with a pink or white Royal icing base and allowing it to set overnight.
I think the stick format is pretty nice to showcase Frida, and I like to imagine she would love some red roses too… Painting was done with food pens and luster powder + everclear.
From black and white, I do a 180. This time is all about color. The mini-projector is the easiest way to deal with all the designs, so if you are seriously into cookie decorating, I must tell you this little gadget will shake your world, in a very positive way… Please, sit back and let me show you some of the cookies that happened in our kitchen in the past few weeks.
Mandalas are wonderful to play with…
And you don’t have to limit yourself to simple circular shapes, the same basic style can be applied to many different designs…
Mandala or not, just embrace the colors, and have fun!
All cookies were made either with my default Neat Edges recipe, or the recently blogged Spicy Chocolate Cookie. For decoration, links to the food safe pens and luster powders can all be found in the end of this post.
One of the things I love the most is to bake a bunch of cookies without anything specific in mind. I cut them in different shapes, flood them with white Royal icing, and wait 24 hours for the icing to fully set. At that point, the fun begins. Whenever I feel like it (but with my cappuccino first thing in the morning is a favorite time), I decorate a few of them. You know I love colorful stuff, but there’s something to be said about a simple, black and white design. I share a few today, all made in the past few weeks.
All you need is a fine tip food safe black pen. My favorite for this type of work is this one. If you don’t have a projector, any design can be transferred using tissue paper, like Tanya, Tent-Baker-Extraordinaire, shows in her sweet video here. For more complicated designs, you won’t need to transfer every single line, you can do the overall frame and then fill in by hand with the fine pen.
Wild cats are a nice subject for the black and white approach…
But other animals will do great too…
If you are a horse person, a dog person, a cat person, there’s always the right cookie for you!
I also like to do a minimal painting sometimes, on a mostly black and white design…
The internet is an endless source of cool images, I save them and slowly work my way through. I close this post with perhaps my favorite image of this group, although the wolf put up a huge fight…
Of all the many gifts my beloved husband gave me, I think the projector goes to the very top of my favorites. It is a total game-changer for cookie decorating. I often flood extra-cookies with Royal icing and save them. In my computer, a folder called “Projector Ideas” collects images I find. One of my favorite pastimes is to paint a few cookies while I have my morning cappuccino. This small collection of cookies were made in the last few weeks. All supplies used are listed in the end of this post.
Perhaps my favorite. I used a real photo as starting point, my first time doing that (won’t be the last). Luster powder diluted with vodka + food-safe pen.
You don’t necessarily need a white background… Turquoise Royal icing flooding, luster powder and black food-safe pen. Spring on a sugar cookie!
Cookies to tell a story: The fox is dreaming of a better planet, in which bees are not risking extinction, flamingoes enjoy their clean lakes, roosters announce each day with joy, dragons live in every little kid’s fantasy land, and everybody is happy as a dog with a big bone in his mouth!
This is Brigitte, another favorite cookie of mine… I find her adorably goofy… Food-safe pen only, details with a very fine tip black marker.
Brigitte has many friends in the forest… Food pen for everything, except the body of the elephant, that was painted with silver luster powder.
Her sister Lolita is always, always hungry….
I really like combining luster dust with food-safe pen. And sometimes a light spray with Diamond Dust like I did in the flower adds another dimension to the image. Although there is also something nice about a simple black and white design.
His name is Alfred
I am very fond of minimalist drawings. Wish I could come up with a design myself, but until I am born again as a new person, “borrowing” things from the internet will have to do.
I often draw them in the evening, after dinner, so I have something to paint in the morning… In fact, they look cute as simple drawings if you want to simplify your life, but I cannot resist the appeal of colors.
The chicken cracks me up. I love a goofy cookie! Fox and Howling Coyote are luster powder only. Chick and Penguin food pen. Unicorn uses both.
This batch went for Phil’s golfing buddies. One is a marine biologist, so the great thing about drawing images on cookies is that you can make it with a special someone in mind.
And abstracts can be a ton of fun too! I have several designs in mind for the near future…
SUPPLIES USED IN THIS POST (I get no commission out of any purchases)
For the Love of Cookies 