Christmas Cookie Decorating Ideas

We do Christmas cookies pretty much every year, and as such we love finding a new cookie cutter to mix things up a bit.  This year, though it be early in the season, we have already stumbled upon some new things we like.

We use a stiff royal icing, to start off with, for anyone wanting to know.

So first, penguins are not commonly thought of in Christmas cookies if I had to guess, but they are consistently the favorites wherever we take cookies.  We have managed to come by a large penguin cutter and now a small baby penguin cutter.

An entire batch of penguin cookies complete with babies?!?!? How could you pass that up!

Another thing that we discovered today that we really like the looks of is using a cabin cutter in gingerbread and making log cabin cookies.  For this one, I drug lines across first, then filled in the window and door, and then made broken lines on the roof in green and a red chimney.  It took just a minute or two and it was adorable!

When doing anything kind of complex, I find it best to make the outline around a cookie and outline any little details like the penguin centers or making the eyes and letting that set a few minutes before filling in a main color.  It is a lot easier to not smear things around that way.

The top right corner are the ridiculously easy lemon cookies I made yesterday from a cake mix that taste delicious. That is a really simple way to add some easy filler cookies to a box and/or mix up the flavor offerings.

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Super Simple Lemon Cookies with Lemon Icing

Ingredients:
Cookies
-1 box Duncan Hines super moist lemon cake mix
-2 eggs
-1/3 C oil
-Optional white chocolate chips

Icing
-1/3 C powdered sugar*
-2 tsp lemon juice

Preheat your oven to 375F.  Mix the cookie ingredients and drop dollops on a greased cookie sheet, smooshing them down just a touch.  I like to use one of those melon baller scoops/small cookie scoops that have the trigger releases.  But relative spoonfuls are fine too.

You will want to space them about an inch and a half or two apart, they will spread a bit. 

Bake at 375F for 12-15 minutes or until the edges are set (this time for me was on light cookie sheets in an electric oven, my dark sheets in my gas oven at school would be shorter, please adjust according to what you use).  They will firm up and flatten out as they cool, and they will form a pretty crackled top.  Transfer them to a wire cooling rack.

Mix the powdered sugar and lemon juice together, adding more powdered sugar by tablespoons if needed to thicken it up.  I made mine the consistency of honey, maybe just a touch thicker.  It set up very well and was nice and tart.

That is actually what I like about these cookies- they are tart yet sweet.  I love a good cookie and I for sure love sugar cookies especially, but mixing it up a bit with a cookie that shies away from being overly sweet is a great change of pace.  These cookies for me came out with a nice soft center, but not one that does not taste done...I am not a fan of liquid cookie goo in the center of my cookies.

Let them sit until the icing sets before stacking or similar.  I did not bake mine with white chocolate chips, but I fully believe that would be a great addition to these cookies.  I adore lemon and white chocolate together! 

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Fresh Cranberry Salad

Ingredients:
-1 bag fresh, whole cranberries
-2 C white sugar
-3/4 C brown sugar
-zest from half an orange
-1/4 C water or orange juice
-1 C mini marshmallows

Add all of the ingredients except the marshmallows to a pan and heat over medium.  You will want to stir it a lot, and will need to cook it approximately 15 minutes to really cook that sugar in and soften the berries.

Remove from heat and allow to cool before stirring in the marshmallows.  You could also add things like pecans or almonds if you wanted. 

Mom used water to make this, but you could most likely get a really great flavor from using orange juice as well. 

I think this is a good thing to know how to make because it is interesting and very versatile, plus it really helps you step back and take a look at how much sugar has to go in to something cranberry to get it to not be so tart.  I think this is something that I definitely if not many people have overlooked when it comes to things like Thanksgiving and cranberry sauce.  Fresh crans pack a pretty feisty kick!

The marshmallows really balance out the tartness that remains, so it works really well together.

Happy crafting, and a very happy Thanksgiving! Pin It Now!

Turkey Cake Pops Version 2.0

You will need:
-Your favorite cake pop recipe, I chose a red velvet and desired filling
-Red and orange candy melts
-skewers or lollipop sticks
-candy eyeballs
-snack size Ziploc bags
-An arrangement base, I used mine from yesterday's post
-Ziploc bags and wax paper

So after you have your cake pops baked, cooled, cored, and filled, you can get to work on putting them together.  Before you dip the birds, you want to make the tails, beards, and beaks.  You can also use butterscotch chips for beaks.  Believe it or not, we were OUT of baking chips.  I sincerely think this is the first time in my life.  But fortunate favors the clever, and most things can be made of chocolate.

So you want to melt the candy melts and pour the chocolate into a Ziploc bag.  Cut a TEENY bit of the corner and pipe out your decorations on to wax paper.  Do NOT cut too much of the corner off or it will be really hard to control it.  You also want to err on the thicker side over super thin decorations as they will be easier to get off the paper.

Leave them be until they are fully set, this should not take too long but may require you popping them in the fridge if you have a really warm house.  Slide a knife slowly and gently under them to pop them off the wax paper.

Melt your chocolate to dip the turkeys in, putting a little chocolate on the stick before you put the cake pop on it to make sure it holds better.  Again, if you have a warm house, freeze the pops for a bit after you insert the sticks so that they will help the chocolate set faster when you dip it.  Dip the turkeys and let a little chocolate drain off of them. Set them on top the tails, holding them if they are not sitting level and are trying to roll. Put the eyeballs on, the beards, and the beak pieces.

Let them sit until cooled and then return them to the base you have prepared. 

I really just expected them to start singing or something I mean honestly to me, it looks like a fun chorus of goofball birds that should burst into song...

Or that should be devoured. But sadly, that must wait until tomorrow.

Happy crafting!

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Easy Holiday Edible Arrangement Base

You will need:
-2 foam blocks or one large block, depending on the desired size of your arrangement.  I am using 2 blocks approximately 3 by 8 or so (rough guess).
-Foil, wrapping paper, scrapbook paper, or other desired covering that you can poke sticks through
-Bamboo skewers
-A tray that fits the amount of foam you have
-Tape (good quality)

I always wrap my foam blocks in paper because it keeps the little foam pieces from getting on things and it makes it look better.  When doing an edible arrangement, you have to think in 3D for multiple reasons.  First, things like cake pops are chunky.  You need space in between them so that they can all fit.  Second, you want to be able to see the things you have included in your arrangement. 

What I do is I cut off the bottom third on long skewers for sticks that will go in the front.  For the next tier, I cut off only about an inch.  The back row stays uncut. Cut all sticks at an angle to make sure you can poke them through the paper and the foam.

Quite frankly, the cut ones are often easier to poke.

Stick central ones in first, then outer ones in at an angle to make a sunburst, or in this case a turkey tail shape.  Use these sticks later to put your cake pops or whatever edibles on and reinsert in the holes.

The last thing you want in an edible arrangement is to try to poke a hole with a delicate treat already attached to the stick.  It is a recipe for disaster.

If you are a little worried that the wood will make whatever you are putting on them taste funky, dip the end of it in chocolate first and let it set. 

I like to secure my blocks to my tray with tape.  It helps the stability and makes it easier for people to grab things and pull them out.

Happy crafting! Pin It Now!

DIY Simple Christmas Canvas Decoration

You will need:
-A canvas size of your choosing, mine was about 5x7
-Paint in the colors of your choosing, I used white and green
-Puffy paint in red or other color as desired

If you are wondering why part of mine looks pink it was because I was trying to paint over a canvas I had messed up just to see if It would work.  You may prefer to start out on a clean slate.

I used red puffy paint to make the tree first, making it whimsical and curly.  Next, I painted my canvas white, after the puffy paint had dried, with crappy cheap paint and put roughly three coats on, to very little avail.  I don't mind, I love a good experiment.

After I was done coating the canvas, I came back with green and added some color to the tree.  This would be fun to have multiple shades of green on hand for.  I of course do not as I rarely paint anything.

Then, I finished it off with the word JOY in red puffy paint.  I would have polyflaked my tree boughs...but my glitter is missing.  It is really killing my soul.

Regardless of the pink showing through, I actually like this concept and it was delightfully easy. I have a few more projects in mind that I may use this for.

Happy crafting! Pin It Now!

Chipotle Cranberry Turkey Wings

Ingredients (increase as needed, this was to fit my round baking dish):
-3 pieces from turkey wings once separated at joint and wing tips removed
-1 TB butter, soft
-Salt
-1/2 C chipotle cranberry sauce, recipe found here
-2 TB brown sugar
-2-3 TB almond flour

Put the wing pieces in the baking dish (I always like to butter any glass dish I am baking in just in case).  Rub them each with a little butter, then give them a healthy dose of salt and a little pepper.

Spoon the chipotle cranberry sauce over them evenly and sprinkle with the brown sugar and almond flour.  The almond flour can be omitted, I just wanted to add it in for a little texture.  To be honest, it was not all that noticeable in the dish, so don't fret too much if you leave it out.

I like to add just a couple TB or so of water to the dish, cover with foil, and bake in an oven at 350F for 35-40 minutes.  I like to remove the foil for the last ten minutes of baking, adding more chipotle sauce if it looks like it needs it.

You need to understand that these should not be eaten if you need to look dainty, delicate, well mannered, or sexy.  You will be a MESS by the time you are done eating them and I must say it is quite an adventure.  Thoroughly enjoyable, and why not get a little messy now and then?  I personally found myself only able to eat one piece per meal having other sides to go with it.  These wing pieces are quite large.

And they were CHEAP.  So I was not afraid to do a little experimenting.  It was quite an adventure cutting them apart and I suggest looking up how to do it because I am not a good resource for that.  I almost became a vegetarian while cutting them up after I got some goo on me.  I have never cut anything like that apart before, I hardly ever even cut apart pork because my mom and I share packs of it and usually she cuts it before giving it to me.  I realize now I am completely spoiled by this. 

But this was a good experience.  Shenanigiving helped me get insight into parts of cooking I usually don't get: having multiple things done at the same time and cutting apart meats, and just how exhausting bigger than usual meals can be to make. 

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