So it’s that time of the year again where everyone’s extremely hyped up about all things Halloween! Funny I should say this, cause Halloween hasn’t been that big of a deal in this part of the world until the last decade or so! No, this blog is not a decade late – in case you’re wondering.
So to cut to the chase, as part of Team Spoonful (the one working behind the scenes most of the time – yeah that marketing admin girl, aka moi, yours truly, the she-wolf that’s always hunching behind the desktop dreaming up decadent food (well, cakes mostly) and whimsical far away travel), I joined the rest of the gang at one of our very fun internal team-building session learning all about nailing that royal icing for cookie decoration! (THANK YOU, BOSS!)
I’ve made cookies for say a dozen times perhaps, but never have I dared to venture into icing kingdom. You can say that the closest I’ve ever gotten was when I was willing away my time on Instagram watching one of those time-lapse videos and dreaming how I could also be doing the same.
So anyhoo, we started our class and I guess you’d probably didn’t want to read a whole lot of mumbo-jumbo about theory stuff so I’m just gonna morph straight into Powerpoint Mode here now.
- STEP 1: Plan ahead. Plan your design well ahead and have an idea of the size, shape, and colours you want.
- STEP 2: Work out what you need based on your design!
So basically there are 2 -3 different stages of icing consistency and you’ll most probably need to have at least 2 for a rather basic design. Hard consistency for outlining and a soft one for flooding your cookie(background colouring). The more liquid you add, the thinner and softer it gets. So picture or write down which stage of icing you will need for which part of your design.
How to tell:
Hard consistency icing forms a peak as you lift up your spoon.
Medium consistency icing drips back into the bowl but the ribbons don’t melt back into the goo that quickly. Probably best for writing.
Soft consistency is more liquidy and often used for flooding backgrounds.
- STEP 3: Prep your ingredients, mix your icing & colour it. Prepare just enough for the design you need to make. Cover unused icing with a wet cloth to prevent it from drying out.
- STEP 4: Transfer them into little mini piping bags. We made our own out of food grade wrappers.
- STEP 5: As with everything else you want to excel in, Practice! Practice! Practice! but, WORK FAST!
Tip: Hold your bags at 90% to the work surface. Squeeze out a bit and test before working directly on your cookie. Use a wet Q-tip to erase mistakes or the sharp end of a toothpick to correct or smooth out the uneven parts.
What I did not expect
You know when I mentioned earlier that half the time I used to watch those Instagram videos thinking how easy it is to decorate a simple cookie? Well, I’ve got to guess again because I realised that there’s so much depth to learning this technique and mastering it that, for a beginner like me, I literally took 3 whole hours to make 3 cookies! That said, they’re still yummy as hell (pun intended!) and it was really fun to be working, learning and relaxing with co-workers!
Now onward to Chirstmas cookies~!