What is the best thickness to do NFSC? I am very new at this this will be first try to do cookies that will go out of the house!! My kids want to give them to friends for Vday.

I personally like to do 3/8" thick, but I know a lot of people do 1/4". If you are really new to cookie-ing, Antonia74 has a great tutorial here on CC called "How to Bake and Decorate Cookies". Have fun!

I roll them the thickness of a wooden spoon handle. I lay two wooden spoons on the counter and roll the dough between them (rolling pin will roll on top of the wooden spoon handles and you'll have a perfectly even cookie every time.)

I do 1/4"... I bought a length of square metal stock that is 1/4" thick, then cut it in half. Like Indydebi, I put one piece of each side so that the rolling pin rests on it and then roll the dough in between. Works great!

I roll mine really thick at 1/2". It makes putting the sticks in super easy!

I roll mine just a little over a 1/4 inch. Any less and I always seem to burn them.

I am finding that 1/2 inch seem to spread too much, even though I love the look of a thick cookie. And I freeze my dough 10 minutes prior to cooking and it STILL spreads at 1/2 inch so I try to shoot for a bit shy of that, I guess it's 3/8 inch. !/4 inch is too thin I think.

CakeDiva - I chill mine too before baking. I agree about spreading when they get thicker, but bakinccc makes it work. Hmmm... did you try pulling back on the baking powder? That should help.

Thank you all very much I love the ideas for keeping them even.

CakeDiva73 - I'd love to say that bakinccc is some secret ingredient that makes all your cookie troubles go away but it's just my screen name!!!! haha

I have to say that my cookies (rolled out to 1/2") do spread a little but they never lose their shape and I don't ever chill anything...just mix, cut and bake. I suppose if I was using fondant the spreading would bother me but I use all royal so it's no big deal.

(I can't believe I'm up at 3am thinking about cookie bouquets I need to do tomorrow!! What better way to pass the time than to hop on cc for a while! Oh, by the way TracyLH...I think you need to get an avatar. I think as a true "forum addict" you should have one. I'd love to see what you'd pick!!!!)

bakinccc
Just was looking at your photos. They are gorgeous. Do you outline first and what do you put your RI base on with. Mine come out looking so nasty so I always use MMF. But they are never pretty

toleshed - thanks for the compliment. I always outline first then fill in usually with a disposable piping bag with the tip cut off. Sometimes I cut off just a tiny tip and other times more depending on how big the area is that I need to fill. If I'm doing really tiny areas then I'll slip a #2 tip into the bag for more control. If your icing is not going on smooth it might need to be thinned a bit. The self-leveling aspect of royal icing is wonderful. Start with a thin layer and after it self-levels if you notice any dips then simply add a little more right there. Just go slowly so you don't overfill.

Gemini - we'll keep working on TracyLH!!!!!!

duh! bakinccc, lol. sorry, I was so tired and loopy. Been making cookies for past 3 days straight and am starting to lose it!

No worries CakeDiva!!!!!!! I certainly don't have an ego so big as to assume everyone knows who or "what" bakinccc is!! It did give me a chuckle though!!!

Bakinccc and Gemini - You are SO funny! Sweetdreams just PM'ed me a few days ago, asking where my avatar was. Was I perhaps waiting for the perfect trademark cookies? Get ready for this... I don't know how to do it! Everytime I have tried, it tells me the image is too big and afte the gazillionth time, I just gave up! Sadly, I am technically challenged to resizing pics and haven't had the time to figure it out. I guess I will have to have my 13 year old do it as he surprised me and I now have a screen saver that has my cookies dancing in and out, left to right, fading, the whole bit. So I will have to set him to task on my avatar!

As for the whole 'Forum Addict' moniker. I am mortified! Eek! I wish there was another name! Perhaps, "She Who Yaps Too Much". I even thought about not posting for a while in hopes that would cause it to go away, but I think it is not how often you do it, but your total number of yaps, I mean 'posts' that you have. "Addict', okay a bit true, but wish there was another name. Oh, boy, I wll get grief when DH sees this! Hey, at least my vice isn't shopping!

Tracy - It took me forever to get my avatar too because of the resizing issue. They someone here on cc told me about shrinkpictures.com. You can shrink your pics to avatar size on there. So.....problem solved...we expect to see an avatar by morning!!!!!!!!!

Oh, you two are so helpful! Once I get my head above water, I will have to give it a whirl!!! Thanks so much!

Sure! I am just counting down the days until he can build me a website! As of this morning, all of my cookies are now in their own little folders labelled by theme and my e-mail banner is a cute pink. I need to put this kid to work!

I bought those bands to put on my rolling pin - love 'em!
I roll my cookies 1/4" (I know it's strange, but I DON'T like a thick cookie )
I actually use two of the bands, one that's 1/4" thick and a second wrapped on top that is the thickness of the silpat that I use for rolling (I roll out on the silpat so that I can drag the dough off/on the baking sheet)

as for the avatar, I use photoshop a lot, I can give instructions on how to do it with that, just let me know!

Thanks, Jen! It sounds like I may have an avatar one way or another!

i like the look *and* taste of thick cookies. just eliminate the baking powder (melissa's recipe, NFSC w/ no BP) to avoid spreading...you will never miss it.

Ops! I'll have to throw another vote of 1/4" as I doubled checked my thickness after reading Jen's posting as I use two rings as well and thought, hmm... I better remeasure. 1/4" it is!