Makin' those cookies look HOT!

So in my last post I mentioned how I went about my sugar cookies. In this post I shall tell you how I decorated them, rather I'd like to say designed them, rocked 'em, used my artistic mojo. I'm not showing off, I'm just proud of myself for not giving in to laziness and really really trying to make these cookies look good.

So first of all is the recipe, easy peasy.

1 cup of confectioners sugar

1 TB corn syrup

2 TB water

food coloring

brush dedicated to kitchen use only

I got together small sauce bowls and ramekins, basically anything small. Made up the icing and divided between each, then added the food coloring. Now the recipe I used states 10 drops. I think that should be personal choice. Some of my colors were light, some darker, just mix them in and keep adding until YOU like the color. You may have to add less or more water, just do it very baby-step like. Add in more sugar if it gets to thin; and don't worry you don't even really need a recipe for this.

I like my brush method for two reasons. One it gives a lighter coat of icing than just dipping the cookie in, and two, it gives you more control over the smaller designs you may have in mind. The back of a spoon works very well for the inital backdrop coat, pour a small amount on your cookie and spread with the back of a spoon. Don't worry if it looks "wrinkly", give it minute and you'll see the icing settles and smoothes out on its own. Remember the spoon method will give you a slightly thicker coat.

To have greater control over your art, use colored sprinkles. The multi color bottles are cheaper, if you want to spent hours seperating the slippery little confections and coerce family members to work for you with future cookie shares. This is the route I took (hey, I told you I'm cheap!). You can get the Wilton Sprinkles, if you'd rather buy presorted.

To get colored sugar, make your own. I didn't think this needed explanation but seems like people will buy expensive colored sugar when they can make as many colors as they would like for far far far less. Take a ramekin of sugar, add a DROP of color and mix very well. To make it darker add another. But beware, at certian point overkill on the food coloring can give you icing. :)

The sugar dries out fast, so if you want to add sprinkles or colored sugar do it as soon as you finish with the backdrop coat. Sprinkle the sugar on, when the icing has gotten slightly thicker (on your cookie) but not quite dry. This is to prevent your colored sugar from melting into your icing coat. Depending on your icing, (one or two of our batches got more thinner than the others) we had to wait to add our sugar.

So that's a lot of help, the most I can give you. Now I kick you out of the nest and see whether you can fly or not. Show me your cookies!