Wow, I am amazed that this summer break has flown by so quickly. More quickly than when I was working full time and commuting. Not sure how that is possible, but it certainly feels that way. Where we live school starts August 20th. That’s exactly 2 weeks away! There are times I wish it didn’t start until after Labor Day like when I was a kid, but in exchange we are out for the “summer” earlier than most people in May. Which means if we take a vacation right after school ends, we beat the crowds.
So the last few days have been a flurry of cookie making. Decorated Sugar Cookie making to be exact. Sometimes I wonder why I can’t be like other moms and just buy the cookies, or make plain circle cookies and slather on some pink frosting, shake some rainbow sprinkles on them and call it a day. But NOOOOOO, I become possessed by some Martha Stewart spirit and wind up turning it into a 3 day cookie making extravaganza for my daughter’s Dance Company’s Bake Sale Fundraiser.
I did my research. I followed the rules and directions and I do have to say that I am quite pleased for my first attempt at this decorating style. I was lucky enough to stumble upon this website that offers really great explanations and how to’s. I wanted to have those professional looking cookies that you find at fancy bakeries. I can see now why they always charge $5 a cookie! However, I’m sure after doing this a few times, I would be able to complete the process much faster.
I was pleasantly surprised by all the compliments I received over these Dance Themed Cookies, taste and the decoration. Everyone in the dance company went berserk for them. They sold out on the first day! Being somewhat of a perfectionist, I see all the things I could have done better, all the little spots that didn’t come out exactly perfect. But in the end cookies were eaten and loved by all.
Here’s the recipe for Rolled Sugar Cookies that was inspired by The Glorious Baker
Ingredients for cookies:
- 1 Cup Golden Flaxseed Meal
- 2 Cups All Purpose Flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 teaspoon good quality vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon of almond extract
- Parchment paper
Directions:
- In a medium bowl, stir together the flour and baking powder and set aside.
- In a separate bowl combine all the dry ingredients and set aside.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, using the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. This should take about 3 minutes.
- Add the egg, vanilla and almond extracts and beat another minute or so.
- Add the flour mixture slowly, mixing after each cup is added. (Be careful not to add too much at a time.
- Blend until all of the flour is incorporated and the dough begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl.
- Take the dough out of the bowl and place it on a piece of parchment paper.
- Place the dough in a large plastic (ziplock type) bag or tupperware bowl with a lid and refrigerate for about 2 hours.
- Prep an area to roll out the dough. I use a roll out mat, and a little flour.
- 15 min before you remove the dough from the refrigerator, preheat oven to 350 degrees (F).
- Take about half the dough at a time and roll it out until about 1/3 to 1/2 inch thick.
Carefully stamp each cookie cutter until that piece is full. (If cookie cutter starts to stick, dip the edges in flour.) - Pick up the scraps and re- roll the dough, continue to stamp cookies until full, then repeat.
- Place cookies on an ungreased cookie sheet and place in the freezer for about 5 -10 minutes. This assures that the cookies stay very cold and will help prevent spreading.
- Take the other half of the dough and repeat the process until all cookies have been stamped.
- If you don’t have enough cookies sheets you should leave the unrolled dough in the fridge until your first batches are completed.
PRO TIP: Place similar sized cookies on the same cookies sheet. That way all the cookies will cook evenly and you won’t have some cookies under-baked and others to crispy.
- Bake cookies for 8-10 minutes depending on the size of the cookie. Bake until they are just barely beginning to take on a golden tone. They will continue to bake as long as then are on the pan, so don’t let then get too brown.
- Cool for just a minute or so on the pan, then carefully remove cookies from the baking sheet and place on a cooling rack.
- This recipe yields about 30, 2 1/2 inch cookies or 16, 3 1/2 inch cookies.
- Once cooled, the cookies can be decorated with frosting, royal icing or rolled fondant.
::: ROYAL ICING RECIPE :::
Ingredients:
- 6 oz (3/4 cup) of warm water
- 5 Tablespoons Meringue Powder
- 1 teaspoon cream of tartar
- 2.25 lbs. powdered sugar
*** Note; if your meringue powder has no vanilla flavor (vanillin powder) in it, add a teaspoon of vanilla extract to this recipe.
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COOKIE DECORATING TOOLS NEEDED
OPTION 1 – Pastry Bag Method:
- Piping bags or Candy Melts squeeze bottles
- Glasses – to stand your icing bags in
- Clean cloths – a few damp and dry ones nearby
- Elastic bands or bag clips
- Piping tips(at least #’s 1-5)
- Couplers
- Toothpicks
- Food gel coloring
- Parchment Paper (Decorating Bags)
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OPTION 2 – Squeeze Bottle Method :
I used this method and it works great!
- Candy Melts squeeze bottles for flood fill
- Decorating Squeeze Bottles with changeable tips
- Clean cloths – a few damp and dry ones nearby
- Piping tips(at least #’s 1-5)
- Couplers
- Toothpicks
- Food gel coloring
- Parchment Paper ( Decorating Bags)
Left: Flood Fill Icing Bottle ************** Right: Border icing and Final Detail Bottles with Changeable tips
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Directions:
- Using Kitchen-aide mixer, pour in the warm water and the meringue powder.
- Mix it with the whisk attachment (or by hand) until it is frothy and thickened…about 30 seconds.
- Add the cream of tartar and mix for 30 seconds more.
- Pour in all the icing sugar at once and place the bowl on the mixer.
- Switch to the paddle attachment.
- On the LOWEST speed, mix slowly for a full 10 minutes. Icing will get thick and creamy.
- You will want this to be thicker at first so you can use this for your borders. (You will add water as needed later for the flood fill.)
- In small bowls place some of the white frosting in each one. Tint with food coloring or thin the icing with small amounts of warm water to reach the desired consistency. For the borders, you want it to be stiff and thicker, but still able to squeeze out.
- Once your desired colors are mixed, then fill each bottle, or parchment bag.
- DECORATE : See below for the how to video’s and ideas.
- While the borders are drying, use the same bowls as before to mix your thinner flood fill icing. This needs to be thin enough to “set” itself in about 10 seconds. Add only a few drops of water at a time. If it’s too runny, then you will had to add more powdered sugar and mix again.
- Fill pastry bags or candy squeeze bottles with flood will icing
- Once your borders are set and dry you can begin filling in all your designs and colors. The possibilities are endless, so watch the videos for inspiration.
- In-between uses, cover the bowl of plain white icing with a dampened tea-towel to prevent crusting and drying. You can also cover each bottle with a tip or damp cloth to prevent them from getting hard or clogged.
In the process of bordering and flood fill. The square cookies can be anything you want. I just wrote out words or drew things with the border icing. This was the only photo I took of the in between process. Next time I will add some step by step photos of each cookie.
PRO TIP: To make sure the icing is at the right consistency for the FLOOD FILL, use the “10 second rule“. Drag a butter knife through the surface of your royal icing and count to 10. If the icing surface becomes smooth in anywhere between 5-10 seconds, then your icing is ready to use. If it takes longer than approximately 10 seconds, the icing is too thick. Slowly add more water. If your icing surface smooths over in less than 5-10 seconds, it is too runny.
Here are some links to some tutorials and decorating ideas that I used to create my cookies.
::: Information ::: Tutorials ::: Pro-Tips :::
- Basic cookie decorating tutorial
- Brush Embroidery Tutorial
- Sweetambs Icing Tips
- Cake Central
- Glorious Treats
- The Decorated Cookie
- 5-Part Video Tutorial – by Karen’s Cookies (Note she does the flood fill while the borders are still wet. I highly recommend for the first few times to let the borders dry so the colors don’t bleed and you don’t mess up the borders.)
- For an over the top cake cookie tutorial check this one out by Julia M. Usher. She has some pretty incredible cookies that don’t even look edible they are so realistic and beautiful.
- The Glorious Baker – Cake Stand Cookies – These are so totally adorable, I wanted to re-create them, however I didn’t find a cake stand cookie cutter in the short amount of time I had to go looking at the store. But in the future I would love to make these.
The Glorious Baker says:
I also highly recommend the book Cookie Craft. This is the best and most complete book I’ve found on decorating cookies. This book has gorgeous photos for inspiration, but also has every bit of information you need, including directions and recipes. Despite the thousands of cookies I’ve made over the years, I still come back to this book for ideas or to refresh my memory on a particular technique.
The finished cookies all packaged up in my Snapware Cupcake & Cookie carrier. I LOVE this thing. Not only does the inner tray flip ever so you can hold cookies, cupcakes, and muffins, I also used it to carry sandwich or burger fixin’s with an ice pack under the inner tray to keep it cool. So many great uses. I got mine at Costco, but you can find them on Amazon.com (click photo to go there) and it comes with 3 stacks with the flipping inner trays.
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