Pretty in Pink Cookie Wreaths

♫ In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan… Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone… ♫

It certainly has been a frosty frosty weekend here in Toronto.  The ice storm hit, many many trees have fallen, the streets are a thick layer of ice and a whole lot of homes are without power.  We were one of the lucky ones who (oh please no jinx) still have power.  Our cable and internet is out which is why this post will be late to the blog this weekend, but honestly – no complaints compared to power outages some people might facing all this Christmas week.  We just had the in-laws over who had no power all last night and today to enjoy some warmth, a hot shower, dinner and coffee!  Impromptu Christmas Party at our place!  A lot of fun :-)

Once this post finally gets put online (maybe I’ll be searching for an open Starbucks tomorrow or something!) I’ll be so happy to be sharing my Cookie Wreaths that were a HUGELY EXCITING project for me this week!!!

So, I was asked again by Rethink Breast Cancer (who I made the mini cupcakes and chocolate dipped strawberries for – check this post out) to create something ‘Rethink’ to say Thank You to 4 locations who donate their space to their terrific program for all kinds events.  Not only does Rethink Breast Cancer run a fantastic program here in Toronto (check out their website here and like theirFacebook page for updates here) but also all over Canada.  So I am super SUPER excited to say I have had my baking shipped all over Canada with this exciting project.  My cookie wreaths were sent nearby to Toronto, to Ottawa and then much further afield to Vancouver and also Calgary!  … That is to say, my cookies have now visited Calgary which is a place I personally have never been to!  The most cool.

Thank you SO much Rethink for giving me this opportunity – it was a lot of fun and I’m so happy I got to create these ‘Rethink’ Cookie Wreaths for your company!
 

I wanted to create something visually appealing, without losing out on taste or flavour, and I had to make sure whatever I baked would be able to be mailed across Canada!  My initial idea (when I maybe was just doing 1 item for the Toronto location!) was to do a tree of star cookies… But these wouldn’t ship too well, so I went to my other idea I had initially proposed which was to do a wreath of cookies.  Using 1 shape of cookie cutter (in my case a star) I planned to ice the cookies, and then arrange them with the points of the star off setting one another, and laying them out on a cake board, glueing them down with royal icing and fixing them into a wreath shape. 

To make it all go with the theme of ‘Rethink’ (as this is who the cookie wreaths would be from), I went with the pretty in pink theme again just like the mini cupcakes from their holiday party!  They use a lot of hot pink in their colouring, and their website has other shades of pink too, so I went with 3 pink colours when I iced the cookies – a bright pink, mid-pink and slightly paler pink as well.  Going for an ombre effect as I layered and placed the cookies in a wreath so that everywhere you looked you would see a different shade of pink.

 

 

 

 

 

I decided to use a basic sugar cookie recipe that I have used with royal icing decorations before and trusted it to hold it’s shape when it baked.   Check out the end of the post to see the full recipe instructions.  

 

I made these 4 cookie wreaths over 35 hours…

Waking and getting up for a 7.30am making of the dough…

A few errands, emails and a bit of work later I got to actually baking the cookies…

 

Leaving the cookies to cool while I went to teach in the afternoon/evening…

Getting home, having a speedy dinner before making royal icing and pinking up the star cookies…
 

All iced and left to go hard overnight… 
 

 

Waking up the next day and assembling the wreaths…

Final touches of the ribbon and then they were ready to be packaged up…

 

Delivery of the cookie wreaths to downtown Toronto and they were FINISHED!

145 cookies baked and iced and done :D

 

An amazing experience to be able to create cookie wreaths that would be used as thank you gifts for a wonderful company serving a truly worthwhile purpose.  I was really glad to be a part of that!  And of course, the exciting part for little baker me to have my cookies used, not only as gifts custom ordered (I like the term cookie commission, or cake commission… I am a musician after all!!)… but also to be shipped across CANADA!!!!!!  Made a pretty awesome year end on a high that’s for sure!

Remember, keep reading below to see the recipe!

As we enter this Fourth Advent (at least it would have been exactly the Fourth Sunday if I hadn’t lost internet due to #icestormTO!) I hope you all have a really really great Christmas week.  Stay warm and safe if you’re still feeling the consequences of this weekend’s bad weather.   

Enjoy time with friends, family, good food and lots of fun times.

 

 

Merry Christmas!!

 

Hannah ♫

 

Ingredients: (This recipe should make around 4 dozen cookies if using a 2/2 ½ inch cookie cutter)

¾ cup butter

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

½ teaspoon lemon extract

2 ½ cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

Method:

1.         In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

2.        Beat in the eggs and extract.

3.       Combine the flour, baking powder and salt and gradually add to the butter-sugar mixture and mix well.

4.       Cover and leave in the fridge for at least 2 hours, or until easy to handle and not too sticky/ warm.

Time out for chilling! …

5.        Pre-heat oven to 400°F and grease baking sheets. 

6.        On a lightly floured surface, roll dough to desired thickness.  I did around 1/8 inch thick for my stars so they wouldn’t be so thin and break too easily… I had shipping to think about!

7.       Cut with cookie cutters and place on greased baking sheets.

8.       Bake in pre-heated oven for 7-9 minutes or until they are lightly browned.  I wanted a slight crunch to the bottom edge of the cookie but still a soft chewable texture too.  I cooked until the very edges started to turn brown.

9.       Let the cookies cool on the pan to let them set.  Then transfer them carefully to a cooling rack and leave to cool completely before icing or decorating.

For the royal icing…

Ingredients:

2 egg whites

2 teaspoons lemon juice

3 cups icing sugar

Food colouring if required.

Tiny amounts of water if needed – the actual humidity can effect how dry or wet your icing turns out.  One day this week (a very very cold and dry -10°C day) I made royal icing and it needed 3 teaspoons of water to get the right consistency… another day, a very wet day before the freezing wet day when it was a very damp and 2°C day it only needed ½ teaspoon to get the right consistency using EXACTLY the same ingredients and method… So don’t panic when yours isn’t quite right, add tiny tiny ½ teaspoons of water at a time until desired thickness is reached.

Method:

1.       Beat egg white and lemon juice a little until blended together.  Do not overbeat.

2.       Add icing sugar gradually, checking the consistency as you go.

3.       If needed, add small amounts of water until the correct thickness is reached. 

4.        If you are using a coloured icing, now is the time to add a few drops of the colour you want!

5.       Fill piping bag with chosen tip and get ready to ice or decorate.

I firstly did the outline of my star shape before flooding the inside of the star. 

6.        Leave to dry completely before assembling into wreath shape.

 

Please let me know if you have more questions about the recipe or how or what I did!