Christmas Sugar Cookies

 About a year ago, I came across a book at the Regina library called The Artful Cookie.  I've always loved cooking/baking and decorative cookies were a new, unexplored area for me.  I took out the book for two weeks and flipped through it and.....that was pretty much the end of that.  I never got to make anything, probably because an unexpected show came up to work on, so when it came time to return the book, I did so with a heavy heart.

Now the new book that everyone on the baking blogs is talking about is called Cookie Craft.  Besides flipping through it at Chapters, I haven't really been able to look at it the same way as the previous book.  I'm far from buying it for myself right now because we're on a tight budget this year since we moved.  As luck would have it, Mel from Mel's Sweet Treats also has the book and tends to post tips and recipes from it.  Until I have my own copy, this totally works for me.

As luck would have it, Mel also lives in the Greater Toronto Area, so she tends to mention where she picks up her supplies.  On Sunday, I hit Michaels Craft Store (with a 50% coupon from Twitter, thank you, thank you, thank you!) for some meringue powder and to check out their other baking supplies (this is also where to get candy melts, as I have 3 bags I'm taking home with me for some Christmas baking).  There is also a Kitchen Plus Outlet store near my place and a Party Packagers, so I spent a few minutes in each store, checking out their selections and their prices.

When I got home later on Sunday, I made a batch of sugar cookies (recipe from Cookie Craft).  I'm terrible at rolling and I didn't have time to stop at a hardware store to buy 1/4 inch wooden planks for measurement, so I just kind of winged it.  Some of the cookies turned out a little lop-sided and thin, but I didn't mind as these cookies were just going to be for Trevor and I.

I only have two cookie cutters, a leaf and a flower, so I tried to be creative with the designs and the colors.  I'm going to wait until I have another coupon for Michaels to get the package of Wilton gels, so I only picked up red and green for a Christmas theme.  In the end though, I learned a lot about icing and flooding the cookies.  One thing is that it takes forever to outline and flood everything.  If you are using more colours, it helps to be organized and have an idea of how you want them to look, but again, since it was only Trevor and I and it was my first time making them, I wasn't too worried.

I followed the royal icing recipe that came with the meringue powder and I nearly destroyed my hand mixer, it was so thick!  I must have thinned it out with another 6 more tbsp of water just to mix it properly.  In the end, I was able to make enough that was thick enough for the borders and then thin enough for the filling.  It helps when the filling is thin too, as you'll spend less time pushing the icing around to fill the edges and the cookies come out more glossy and less lumpy.  The filling is what takes the longest to dry, so we had cookies spaced out on every available clean surface in the apartment.  When I got home from work today, I finished the rest of the decoration.

Now that you've read this far, I assume that you want to see the cookies, correct?

Here you go!

If there are any left on Thursday, I'll probably take a bunch home with me.  If not, that's okay since I made a ton of royal icing and I'll be taking that home to share with everyone.