Christmas Gingerbread Cookies

my friend blu is a professional cake decorator. she creates these beautiful, fancy cakes - and it's far beyond my comprehension how she does it. granted, baking isn't something i get very excited about, so i'd rather just admire her work than try to emulate it. :)

anyway, i bake christmas cookies with my mom every year, which we did this year, but blu suggested we have another cookie decorating evening. i was excited about this because mom and i tend to make the same recipes every year - they're really good, and they're our traditional christmas cookies, so it's hard to give any of them up in order to try new ones. so, this was my opportunity to try something new! i've seen (and enjoyed!) blu's christmas cookies from past years, and they are something special. they look super fancy, and taste fantastic.

this year, blu and her friend rebel made gingerbread cookies in a variety of shapes, and brought them down to decorate. she brought royal icing (which i've never worked with) and food coloring. she also brought glitter, which was my favorite part of it all. that sounds odd, i know - but it's food glitter! you use little paint brushes to apply it to the gingerbread - it's easy to apply whatever design you like, and it's totally edible. it doesn't actually have any taste.

i was quite challenged by the application of the royal icing. to ice the cookies, blu made two separate batches of royal icing base - one thick, and one thin. she then separated the batches and created a couple different colors out of each. to apply the icing, you create a thin border around the outside edge of the cookie using the thick icing. you then fill inside the border with the thin icing. after you do that, you can create designs in the icing (which was WAY beyond my capability!).

we started the project by applying the icing, and then blu brought out the glitter. i found myself feeling rather stressed out by the icing application. a steady hand and a lot of patience is required - neither of which i had much of. i think i could enjoy it more outside of the chaos of the holiday season.

i loved the glitter application though. it was really easy to create fun designs, and, well, i love glitter. i'm not ashamed. :-)

these pictures are blurry! in the one below, blu and rebel are mixing the icing, and i'm just watching from the sidelines. with my shot o' vodka.




here blu is showing us how to apply the icing.



below, on the right, are some completed gingerbread cookies. (on the left are date pinwheels, which i made with my mom.)

the gingerbread cookies in this photograph don't have icing, just glitter. the one underneath is a purple present box with polka dots. the one on top is my gingerbread version of tony. :-) yup, that's correct, gingerbread tony is wearing a gold tank top and striped shorts with a green belt. how stylish.



all in all, i had a good time visiting with rebel & blu, and using glitter to decorate the cookies. the icing application, however, was just a bit too ... what's the right word? meticulous or nitpicky are close enough, i guess ... i'd have to be in a very particular mood to try it again. :)