It’s the most wonderful time of the year…
I was thinking about the art I do and how it varies- even the media because I consider my cookie baking and decorating to be an art form! I get the itch this time of year to clean all my gorgeous copper cookie cutters and start baking big-time batches!
But first, I had to make a few changes. I was tired of struggling with my cooky media- icing!
Batch after batch of royal icing every year is always a surprise. The conditions are the same, the ingredients are the same, but I never know what I’m going to get. I tried Wilton Merengue powder ( tastes awful) and egg whites, and pasteurized egg whites, but nothing could ever be consistent! Then there was the food coloring- which ended in disaster several times and (thanks again Wilton!) a nasty surprise when my pots of Wilton coloring were drying out and now I had chunks of dry food dye in my icing.
I’m done. Done with poor quality ingredients from Wilton, done trying to make pasteurized egg whites behave, and done fiddling with icing!
I’m also done with the downhill quality of everything! Last year my cooky bags were such poor quality that they off-gassed plastic stink all over my cookies and made them taste awful after a week!
This year will be different- I can feel it in my soul. I ordered good, baker’s quality merengue powder, gel food coloring, and quality cooky bags. I refuse to work as hard as I do and pour as much love as I can into cookies that are plagued by problems! This year has to be good- I am making them for everyone in my school building!!!
First I do some research and get inspiration from my Martha by Mail catalogs and my cooky inspo folder!
I have two new cookie cutters this year- the wreath ( Michael Bonne version- its better, has a bow) and the Jolly Snowman. If you buy holiday cutters in the summer they are pretty cheap! 😉
I got great advice and a fool-proof royal icing recipe here:
https://www.thecookiecountess.com/blogs/recipes-and-tutorials/royal-icing-recipe
I put in my amazon order right away and ordered these bags:
And this amazing merengue powder:
I’ve got my apron on, my radio set to Christmas music, Home Alone playing on the TV, and I’m ready! Let’s GOOOOOO!
Heirloom Gingerbread Cookies II
6 Cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3 teaspoons ginger
3 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon cloves
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 & 1/2 teaspoon salt
2 sticks butter
1 Cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 Cup unsulfured molasses
Mix together all dry ingredients with a wire whisk. In a separate bowl or the bowl of your stand mixer, cream together, butter and sugar, then add eggs. Mix in dry ingredients and molasses altering cups of each until done and a dough forms.
Divide dough into 4 balls and flatten. This dough works best if you use it right away but can be wrapped in plastic wrap and refrigerated. Allow to come to room temp. before baking with it.
When ready to bake, put some dough onto Silpat. First cover dough with a sheet of plastic wrap, then roll out with the rolling pin. Cut out cookies and gently remove negative or extra dough from around them. You can do this by rolling up the extra dough with your finger once you pull up a piece. Leave the leftover cookie shapes on the same Silpat to bake on a cookie sheet. Bake for 10 minutes in a 350 Farenheit oven. Let cool on the Silpat on the cookie sheet while another batch bakes. Then transfer carefully with a long metal spatula to your storage container. This way your very large cookies won’t break. Put layers of wax paper between completely cooled cookies so they won’t stick together in storage.
First I start with all the dry ingredients first 5 giant batches. I make everyone leave the kitchen so I can count. Lol
Then the butter magic.
Then the cookie baking.
A rest after all of that! It takes all day! I made 90 cookies!
The next day I start on the icing. I am soooo excited to try this recipe and IT DOES NOT DISAPPOINT! Hooray!
Cookie Countess’ Royal Icing
1/3 Cup Genie’s Meringue Powder
1/2 Cup warm water
3 Tablespoons lemon juice (or water)
2 pounds powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla (or almond)
1 Tablespoon light corn Syrup (we call it white Karo in my southern family)
In a stand mixer with the whisk put the meringue powder and water in the bowl and whisk until double in size, about 1-2 minutes. Add in vanilla and lemon juice (or sub in water) whisk in until just incorporated. Switch to the paddle attachment and add in 1 pound of the sugar (1/2 the bag). Combine. Mix in the light corn syrup. Then add in the rest of the sugar, combine. Mix for about 2-3 minutes on high. The icing will turn white and get floofy. Do not over mix. This will make very stiff icing. You can thin it with teaspoons of water.
I desperately needed some new royal icing ideas and got plenty from the cookie countess. I was intrigued by the marbling technique and decided to try it on my wreaths. I had 90 cookies to basecoat so I needed help!
Here they are ready to deliver!!! And don’t worry- there were still plenty more for my family!
Now that I’m done, I want to make some more- maybe some orange-spice sugar cookies this time…
Because my sweet husband let me have my Christmas present while I was waiting for the icing to dry!
Isn’t that beautiful! It’s the Martha by Mail Present cookie cutter – one of the last made and rare. So ridiculously expensive on E-Bay but the copper smith, Michael Bonne, who produced all the MBM cooky cutters makes and sells them (and a lot more catalog designs) for reasonable prices on his website! Michael even signed and dated my cutter which I ADORE! This is such a thoughtful present! I want to make more cookies with it! (Wait a second- did my husband do this on purpose to get more cookies?) HA!
With all the cookie-love to you from me on Kansas Street,
-Jaime
Life on Kansas Street 