Katie Kay's Kitchen: Thanksgiving / Fall Cookies

Photo by Katie Kay

Theme cookies are so much fun! I wanted to make Halloween cookies but never had the time. I was very motivated this weekend and stayed up way too late a few nights in a row working on these Thanksgiving / Fall cookies. I had no reason to make them other than to share them with you, and the whole time I wondered where I was going to offload all this sugar. My kids' teachers, Matt's co-workers, and my co-workers are getting an even distribution. The neighbors are tired of my cooking, I'm sure. I don't want to wear out that welcome.
My first Royal Icing cookies were for Jenson's 4th birthday last year. Pictures of cake and cookies here. Shark cookies were a pretty complicated 1st cookie, and while they weren't perfect, they were great practice and Jenson loved them! Of course he did, because sharks are violent animals that eat people.
Ergo--awesome.
I miss my highlights. Do you ever see old pictures of yourself and realize you liked the way you looked better back then? Of course, because we're always younger.

Photo by Matt S.

My second Royal Icing cookies were for Kaylen's pink and zebra birthday party 2 years ago. My black zebra stripes are actually a 2nd layer over the color. I outlined the letter then flooded it with color. After it dried, I added the black stripes. Next time I'll be much more comfortable using 2 colors in the same layer and using a toothpick to drag the black zebra stripes for a smooth top. Still, she loved them!

Photo by Katie Kay

I like this recipe by Bake at 350 for Vanilla-Almond Sugar Cookies. I rolled most of my batches out too thin, and I found that the thicker ones packed more flavor and softness. Definitely stick with her recommendation for rolling out the dough at 1/4". They hold their shape perfectly.
See my nekkid turkeys?

Photo by Katie Kay

I used Bake at 350's Royal Icing recipe as well. I agree with her, the flavor of the Royal Icing varies greatly with brands of meringue powder used. My preference is Ateco. I've used Wilton and one I got from Amazon.com that had good reviews in a white container with gold label, and I didn't like either one of them.

As my cookies chilled and baked (so time-consuming), I wrote out exactly what colors I would need and what I would be using them for so that I could buy any missing colors (brown and dark green) and know how much to make of each color. I prefer Americolor, however I went to Michael's and all they had was Wilton. I ended up using a combination of the 2 brands for the colors below.

Orange Royal Icing - Outline and flood pumpkins, Turkey beaks, tail feathers, Turkey legs

Brown Royal Icing - Turkey body Green Royal Icing - Pumpkin stems Red Royal Icing - Turkey wattle (yes I had to look that up), tail feathers Yellow Royal Icing - tail feathers Black Royal Icing - Turkey eyes Orange sugar or pearl dust - pumpkin creases
I put them in order of how much I would need, starting with the most at the top. After I made my Royal Icing, I divided my colors and mixed them, storing them in tupperware with saran wrap between uses.
First I piped all of my borders using a #2 tip with the still thick Royal Icing. Once you thin it for flooding, there's no going back! This included:
1) The pumpkin border 2) Brown turkey border 3) Red turkey wattle 4) Orange Turkey Beak 5) Turkey legs 6) Green pumpkin stem (which I actually didn't do until later but it would make sense to do it now)

Photo by Katie Kay

After I piped and bordered everything, I thinned my orange icing and flooded my pumpkins. Then I set them aside to dry while I finished the rest of the cookies. When I was done--about an hour later--I used a toothpick to gently drag pumpkin creases in the pumpkins for depth. When they were completely dry the next day, I used a small brush to gently brush orange pearl dust in the creases. I think fine orange sugar would have worked as well.

Photo by Katie Kay

Then I thinned my brown, red and yellow icing. My orange was already thinned from the pumpkins. I worked on about 5 cookies at a time, and flooded the brown in the turkeys first. Then I put one drop of red, orange, and yellow in each tail feather.

Photo by Katie Kay

Using a toothpick, I gently dragged the color in little Pac-man ghost shapes, thinking they might resemble feathers. Not so sure about that, but I liked the look anyway.

Photo by Katie Kay

Then I flooded the pumpkin stems with green and set everything aside to dry. After about an hour, I put the black eyes on the turkeys and let everything dry overnight. After a few hours I checked on how they looked, and was horrified when the color seemed streaky and uneven. But the next morning, it had all evened up and I guess it was just streaky as it was drying. The pumpkin creases aren't as shadowed as I wanted, so next time I might use a brown pearl dust instead. I also really liked the flavor and look of the Chocolate Sugar Cookies better, and I got that recipe from Sweetapolita. Again, thicker was better.