Zombie Skull Cookies for Halloween

This crazy summer has finally passed so I've been trying to catch up on all of the things I've lost track of. Here's a quick post of some Halloween cookies I made last week so I can get back into the swing of things.

The original cookies and tutorial that inspired me to make these cookies can be found here.

Enjoy!

Mother's Day Sugar Cookies and a Recipe for Tropical Trifle

For Mother's Day a couple of years ago I made some really cool monarch butterflies from Hello Cupcake. They were my favorite cupcakes to make by far and I wanted to try and recreate them into a sugar cookie for Mother's Day this year.

I hosted a Mother's Day BBQ for my mother and mother-in-law and decided to make my cousin Jeff's trifle to accompany the cookies for dessert. Every year his trifle is requested at all of the family holidays and it's a perfect springtime dessert with hints of coconut, crushed pineapple, and mandarin oranges. The best part is you can cook the components the night before and assemble it the day-of to make the day even less stressful.

 Jeff's Tropical Trifle

2 cans crushed pineapple, juice reserved

2 cans mandarin oranges

1 box yellow cake mix

1 box vanilla cook and serve pudding, not instant pudding

1 box coconut cook and serve pudding, not instant pudding (can used 2nd box of vanilla if coconut isn't available)

3 cans Goya coconut milk

2 cup shredded coconut, divided

1 cup malibu rum

1 pint heavy cream

Night before/morning of

1. Substituting coconut milk for regular milk, make pudding according to package directions (mix powders from both packets into one pot). While the pudding is cooking make sure to stir the pudding constantly so the bottom of the pot doesn't get scorched. Once pudding has thickened add 1 cup of shredded coconut to pudding and place on counter to cool. To prevent a skin from forming, place plastic wrap directly on the pudding. 

(If making the night before, once the bowl is cool to the touch, place in refrigerator until you're ready to assemble the trifle)

2. Drain the two cans of crushed pineapple, saving the juice, and place solids into a non reactive bowl. Prepare the cake mix replacing the water with an equal amount of pineapple juice and bake on a jelly roll sheet following the box instructions.

3. Drain the mandarin oranges and add the fruit to the bowl of crush pineapple. Add 1 cup Malibu rum and allow to soak into the fruit as long as possible (night before would be best). If there's any left over pineapple juice after the cake is baked, you can add it back into the fruit mixture. Refrigerate mixture if making the night before. 

Day of

4. Assemble trifle by cutting a circle of cake using the trifle bowl as a guide. Build by placing a layer of cake into trifle bowl, topping that with a layer of mixed fruit (approximately half) and drizzling some of the leftover juices onto the cake. Top the fruit with a layer of pudding and repeat until you reach the top of the trifle bowl.

(I actually had enough left over to make one more mini trifle in a canning jar for lunch the next day... Yum!)

5. Top trifle with fresh whipped cream and remaining coconut.

Enjoy!

Happy Easter and Some Bunny Themed Sugar Cookies

Spring is finally here and my Easter wouldn't be complete without some sugar cookies.

I love all of the designs from Cookies with Character but when I saw the Peek-a-Boo Bunnies, my heart flip flopped. An animator by trade, her designs are adorable and original and I could spend hours looking through her blog.

I also drew my inspiration for my Easter bunny cookies from the Sweet Adventures of Sugar Belle. If you haven't been to her site before she has a ton of information on cookies and cookie decorating.

The recipes for sugar cookies and royal icing are both from Sugar Belle's and can be found here and here.

Enjoy!

Vanilla Sprinkle French Macarons

This post has been a long time coming. I've been wanting to write it forever but couldn't muster up the energy and courage to do it. These cookies are not easy to perfect. If you are a perfectionist like me when it comes to baking, they will give you headaches and make you want to cry. That said, if you can accept that you will have delicious cookies that may not look perfect every single time you make them, they are definitely a cookie you should try. 

I first started making macarons last fall after paying $2.97 for a single cookie. I knew I was decent at baking and figured I could figure out how to make them. I read, I researched, I googled and youtubed, and after all of that I found out they were difficult but not impossible to make. My entire first batch exploded save for two lone shells. I sought out different recipes, some called for all the ingredients to be weighed, others using measuring cups. The frustrating part was that I had success and failures with both. There would be weeks when my shells came out right and others where I couldn't make a single cookie, even when using the same recipe. I felt so overwhelmed that I was almost ready to quit making them when I found the right recipe just at the right time.

Knock on wood, each time I've made this recipe I've had pretty little feet and smooth tops on every shell. It doesn't call for weighing ingredients but as long as your consistent with your measuring methods, it shouldn't be a problem.

So here's the recipe I've been using, no scale required.

Vanilla French Macarons- total recipe time 1-2 days *

1 3/4 cup powdered sugar**

1 cup almond flour**

3 large egg whites, room temperature

1/4 tsp cream of tartar

pinch of salt

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

* Completed cookies take 1 day to mature and be perfect to eat, overbaked shells take 2 days

* *Fluff with a spoon before delicately scooping out and placing in measuring cups making sure to level off with the flat edge of a butter knife

Vanilla Buttercream:

1 stick of butter, softened

1 1/4 cup powder sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp milk

Additional things you will need: 3 baking sheets, parchment paper, 12" piping bag, 1/2" piping tip, decorative sprinkles

1.  Combine powdered sugar and almond flour. Sift and discard any pieces too large to pass through sieve (approximately 1-2 TBSP). Set aside.

2. Combine egg whites, cream of tartar, and pinch of salt in the metal bowl of an electric stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment (a clean, metal bowl is necessary for producing a nice meringue, it keeps the egg whites cool and gives them more volume). Beat the egg whites on speed 6 until frothy (a minute or two). Bump up the speed to 8 and slowly add granulated sugar. Whip until a firm meringue forms an additional 5 minutes (approximately 8 minutes from turning the mixer on). The meringue should clump together on the interior of the whisk attachment as shown below.

3. Add the almond-powder sugar mixture to the meringue and begin folding together by swiping along the bottom edge of the bowl with a flexible spatula and pressing back down firmly on center of the path that was drawn in the batter. Add the vanilla extract. 

The motion of the folding will be like drawing a letter 'p' using the edge of the bowl for the straight part of the letter and folding back over on itself for the loop of the p. Mix until batter flows like lava off the edge of the spatula in a ribbon-like fashion (takes approximately 1-2 minutes depending on how hard you are deflating the batter). The whole purpose of the folding the batter is to deflate it and get rid of the air, so no need to be gentle.

4. Fit a 12" piping bag with a 1/2" round piping tip and twist the tip-end to prevent batter from leaking out. Place bag tip first into a large drinking glass and fold bag over edge of the cup to make for easy batter transfer. 

Piping bag fitted with tip before I twisted the tip to close it off

5. Pipe quarter size circles onto a parchment lined baking sheet (if the first couple of piped shells have peaks that do not flatten out, the batter is not mixed enough. Squeeze batter back into bowl and fold a few more times until consistency is right and pipe again). Slam baking sheet on the counter top to release any air bubbles to prevent shells from exploding. Add any decorative sprinkles to half of the shells now and allow to rest for 30 minutes or until tops are no longer tacky to the touch (can take up to an hour depending on humidity). Preheat oven to 290 F.

6. Place a second baking sheet underneath the first tray of macaron shells and bake for 22 minutes. Repeat with other sheets of shells. During the first 4-6 minutes the foot of the macaron will begin to form, this is the most nerve wracking part. You can check for doneness by trying to remove a shell from the parchment paper. If it comes away clean, they're done. It's better to over bake then under bake macarons, as the latter can't be fixed later. Allow shells to cool on baking sheets.

7. While shells are cooling mix together the butter, powder sugar, milk, and vanilla extract for the buttercream icing.

8. After shells have cooled, remove from parchment paper and match up like sized shells, sprinkles for the top and plain shells for the bottom. Pipe a quarter size swirl of buttercream on one of the paired shells and top with its match.

9. Place macarons in an airtight container and allow to mature for 1-2 days. It's horrible to wait, I know, but the buttercream softens the shell and everything melds together during this time. It's especially necessary if the shells are over baked, as the buttercream will take away the bite of a overly crisp shell.

Here are two great websites for macaron troubleshooting that really helped me out when I started baking them. They use different recipes with different ingredients but are really great sources if you run into a problem.

Food Nouveau

Not So Humble Pie

Give it a try and let me know how it goes! Enjoy!

Click here for some pictures of my past macaron projects

Be sure to follow me on instagram @rocky092 for more macaron, cookie, and baking posts

Easy Peppermint Christmas Coal Cookies

This fun Christmas treat is perfect for anyone, regardless if they're on the naughty or nice list. I've seen the recipe floating around on Pinterest for years but thought I'd give it a try this Christmas.

Christmas Coal

1 16 oz package of chocolate sandwich cookies

5 cups mini marshmallows

4 tbsp butter

1/2 tsp vanilla or peppermint extract

1. Pulse sandwich cookies in food processor until finely ground.
2. In a medium bowl combine marshmallows, butter, extract, and ground cookies
3. Heat in microwave for 1 minute then mix until well combined.
4. Drop small clumps (careful, it may still be hot) onto parchment paper and allow to cool.

Enjoy!

Mickey Gingerbread Cookies

I can't even remember the last time I made gingerbread cookies, it was easily over 10 years ago. For some reason this year I was craving them and when I saw this adorable Mickey Mouse cookie cutter  I knew I had to buy it and make some. I usually don't spend more than a couple bucks on cookie cutters, but for this one I made an exception.

Gingerbread Recipe

1 cup butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1 1/4 cup molasses
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
6 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for rolling
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 tsp ground ginger
3 tsp ground cinnamon
1 ½ tsp ground cloves
2 tsp ground nutmeg

1. Cream butter and sugar in a medium bowl. Add molasses, eggs, and vanilla extract. 
2. Mix together dry ingredients with a whisk in a medium bowl. Add one cup of mixed dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, incorporating each addition before adding the next.
3. Divide dough into three portions and wrap in plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 1 hour. While dough is chilling preheat oven to 375 F.
4. Spread flour onto your working surface and roll dough to approximately 1/4" (Rolling pin guides are AMAZING. They take all of the guesswork out of rolling out dough and come in a few different sizes. You can find them here).
5. Cut out cookies and place on parchment lined baking sheets. Baking time is 10 minutes for a 4" cookie, 2 minutes less or more for a smaller or larger cookie respectively. Be careful not to burn the cookies since its hard to tell if they're browning or not. Start with 8 minutes for a medium 4" cookie then increase the baking time if needed.
6. Let cool and then decorate! I decided to dip the ears in chocolate to make them look like they were wearing little mouse ear hats, plus it only took a couple of minutes extra.

Enjoy!

Sue's Mandelbread Cookies

In preparation for the holidays, kitchen Kaplan was in full swing this Sunday morning. We made chocolate covered pretzels, gingerbread men, forgotten kisses, and my personal favorite, mandelbread cookies.

Mandelbread is a traditional Jewish cookie that is similar to a biscotti, but with this recipe they almost melt away in your mouth while maintaining a satisfying crunch. We used chocolate and butterscotch chips but I'm really excited to try the recipe with dried cranberries and pistachios as well. Here's the recipe we made this morning.

Sue's Mandelbread Cookies

3 cups flour

1 tsp salt

2 tsp baking powder

3 eggs

1 cup sugar

1 cup oil

7 oz chocolate chips

5 oz butterscotch chips

3 tbsp cinnamon and 3 tbsp sugar combined for dusting

1. Preheat oven to 375 F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Mix together dry ingredients in a large bowl then add wet ingredients until well combined. Mix in chocolate and butterscotch chips.

2. Divide mixture into 3 loaves onto parchment lined baking sheet and sprinkle each with cinnamon sugar. Bake for 20 minutes until lightly golden brown.

3. Cool for 15 minutes then slice into  3/4" pieces across the short side. Arrange cookies cut side up on the baking sheet and bake for an additional 15 minutes.

Enjoy!

Be sure to follow me on instagram @rocky092 for more baking and cookie posts

Skull and Crossbones Cookie Tutorial

Here's the tutorial for the skull and crossbone cookies as promised. I've been experimenting with a glaze (which has added corn syrup for more shine and a softer texture) instead of royal icing which can be a little dry and grainy for me. There are two icing consistencies that are used when decorating cookies, flood and piping. 

Flood icing aka 20 second icing is used to ice large areas of cookie and results in a smooth, even finish. Piping consistency is used for borders to keep flood icing in place and for details that need to keep their shape. 

When mixing colors I usually start with a medium consistency of icing, color it, then reserve a third of it to thicken for piping and thinning out the rest for flood. 

Piping icing should be the consistency of toothpaste and should be firm enough to hold it's shape, but not so firm that it breaks while piping. To get this consistency, I add powder sugar until the desired thickness is reached. 

Flood icing should have a honey-like consistency, thin enough so it easily smooths for an even finish but not so thin that it runs over. I add very small amounts of water (a few drops at a time) and mix until this consistency is reached. Another way to test for this is to draw a line in the icing with a spatula and count how many seconds it takes for it to smooth out again (as the names suggests, it should take about 20 seconds). 

Here are the step by step instructions for decorating the skull and crossbones sugar cookies as well as some other shots of the cookie decorating process. 

For the glaze icing 

2lbs powdered sugar 

1/4 c corn syrup 

1/4 c water 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract (clear if you need bright white icing) 

1/2 teaspoon butter extract 

The icing will need to be thickened for fine details and thinned slightly for flooding

For the skull and crossbone cookies you will need: 

White piping and flood icing 

Black piping icing 

Red flood icing (or any color of your choice for the bandana) 

4 disposable piping bags 

4 icing couplers 

Two #3 and two #12 piping tips 

P.S. Read my post from earlier this week on the best icing tip ever. 

Here is a royal icing recipe which I thought was a little easier to start out decorating with.

1. Trace out eyes, nose, and bandana on each skull cookie using food safe markers

2. With piping icing, outline the skull, eyes, and nose onto the cookies. If you don't want to fill in the eyes with black icing, make sure to pipe on the insides of the lines otherwise the marker will show (hindsight is 20/20).

3. With the flood icing, pipe along the edge of the piping icing so that the two consistencies overlap slightly. Keep to the inner edges so that the flood icing doesn't run over the sides the skull. Allow to dry for at least a half hour. 

4. After the first layer has dried to the touch, use piping icing to make teeth. Starting with the top row, alternate teeth and allow to dry for a half hour. Repeat with the lower row of teeth and allow to dry for another half hour. While the teeth are drying you can skip to steps 6-8 to save time in between the drying of the teeth. 

5. Fill in the missing teeth by piping more ovals between the teeth that have already dried. 

6. Pipe bandana ouline onto top of skull cookie with the piping icing. If any marker is showing you can also fill in the eyes and nostrils with the piping icing. 

7. Flood bandana with your color of choice flood icing. Pipe outlines on the cross bones and let dry for 15 minutes.

8. Flood crossbones using the same method in step 1. Add any additional details you like to the bandanna using piping icing. 

9. Allow cookies to dry overnight. I actually find glaze to be more prone to damage in transfer as compared to royal icing, so be careful when transporting them. 

Here are some more images from my cookie decorating night including the ghosts and spider web cookies

Piped ghost pumpkin spice sugar cookies 

Finished ghosts

The cookie station 

Piped outline on spider cookies

Finished web cookies

Finished spider and web cookie set

Midway through skulls and ghosts

Complete Halloween set

Be sure to follow me on instagram @rocky092 for more cookie and baking posts