Sexy Cookies

Fancy Pants

        Everyone loves cookies! And what better type of cookie to love than sexy cookies? Yes, you read properly, sexy cookies. We're talking bra and panty cookies. Miss McGrath called me up a few weeks back and we decided to make cookies for her girlfriend's bachelorette party. She already had the idea, and knew what she wanted them to look like, all we had to do was harness our talents and make them.


        First, gather your ingredients and a hand mixer. The hand mixer (or stand mixer) is key, unless you have a few friends to share the duty of mixing. We used a new sugar cookie recipe, and we found it to be very crumbly, but this could have been because we lacked the hand mixer. I won't give you that recipe, instead, I'll give you the recipe for my tried-tested-and-true sugar cookies.



Sugar Cookies
1/2 cup shortening (or you could just use room temperature butter)
1/3 cup margarine (or you could just use room temperature butter)
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2 1/4 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

Fly by the seat of your pants

1. Using your hand mixer or your stand mixer cream shortening (butter), margarine (butter), sugar, eggs, and vanilla until creamy. 
2. Sift and measure the flour (sifting the flour breaks up clumps and adds air to the flour which helps produce lighter cakes and pastries, and makes measurement more uniform).
3. Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt (sifting here helps to incorporate the dry ingredients).
4. Add flour mixture gradually to sugar mixture. Beat at low speed until blended (if you have the mixer on high when you add the flour you will get a face full of white powder).
5. Cover dough and chill for 1 hour in the fridge or 10 minutes in the freezer (this is necessary to re-solidify the fat which is necessary for you to roll it out).
6. Do all your dishes and tidy the kitchen (this step comes from Momma O).
7. Preheat your oven to 375°F. 
8. Lightly flour your clean counter top and roll out your dough using a floured rolling pin (if you don't have a rolling pin, a wine bottle covered in plastic wrap works just as well). Don't roll it too thin, about 1/4" thick.
9. Using a heart shaped cookie cutter, cut the dough. Reroll the dough until no dough remains. Cut the triangular tips off half of the hearts.
10. Bake on an ungreased baking sheet for 8 to 10 minutes until edges are light brown.
11. Cool slightly then remove from pan with lifter and place on wire rack to cool.

        Now that your cookies are baked, you must wait until they are fully cooled before you start to ice them. While the cookies were cooling, Ms. McGrath and I googled images of the designs that she wanted to cookies to look like. Once we had our idea, we made the icing.

Royal Icing

4 cups of confectioner's sugar (icing sugar)

3 tablespoons meringue powder

1/2 tsp vanilla (or almond) extract

Gel paste food colouring

1. In a large bowl, combine the sugar, the meringue powder, 1/2 a cup of warm water, and the extract. Using an electric mixer (hand mixer) on medium speed, beat until the mixture is fluffy, yet dense (about 7-8 minutes).
2. To thin the icing, use a rubber spatula to stir in additional warm water, 1 tsp at a time. To test the consistency, drizzle a spoonful of icing into the bowl; a ribbon should remain on the surface for about 5 seconds.
3. Separate the icing into different bowls (use as many bowls as colours you would like to use). Using a toothpick add the desired colours to the bowls of icing and mix well.
4. If you don't use all the icing you can store it covered in the refrigerator for up to a week. Remember to stir it vigorously just before using.

        Fill your different piping bags with each of the different colours. Start icing by outlining the area you want to ice, once you've done the outline, wait just a minute, then fill it in with the colour of your choice. Once it dries you can add second and third colours for a layered look. To make the super tiny dots and lines, use a toothpick.

Scaredy Pants

For a marbled effect

        Pipe your icing around the border, then pipe the icing into the middle of the cookie, letting it run to the edges of the border. While the icing is still wet, pipe various sizes of dots and lines in 1 or 2 different colours on top of your first colour. Using a toothpick or a skewer, quickly swirl the colours together, making only 8 to 10 figure 8 motions and stopping before the colours are completely combined. Gently tap the cookie to settle the icing.

For a polka dot effect

        Pipe icing around the edge of each cookie and then pipe the icing into the middle of the cookie, letting it run to the edges of the border. While the icing is still wet pipe dots of various sizes in different colours into the icing. Gently tap the cookie to settle the icing.

        Take your time, don't rush, and have fun with it. Make them as sexy or as modest as you want. Make sure you let the the cookies dry completely, for at least 6 hours or up to overnight before stacking.

                                                                              Enjoy!

                                                                                 Mel