Ok, I've finally found a butter cookie recipe that I love. My instructor for my Wilton classes says she uses plain old royal icing to ice and decorate her cookies. I tried it and it was like biting into a rock. Did I do something wrong or are decorated cookies all about the art and not about the taste? I could definitely use some help on this.

Alot of people still like the "crunch" of the royal. I have tried Toba's, Antonia's, Wilton's, MMF and rolled BC, and regular old buttercream. I get LOTS of compliments on the MMF. I think it all depends on what kind of decorating I am going to do...if I need to flood or not, if I am going to be piping details, will cookies need to be stacked, etc.

I LOVE BC on mine.

I use Antonia74's recipe for modified royal icing, and get rave reviews every time. It tastes great, and while it is firm, it's certainly not crunchy!

You can find her recipe along with her method in the tutorial she did on this website called "How to bake & decorate cookies".

Laura.

Antonia's icing is wonderful for decorating cookies with. I would love to have time to try some of the others like Toba's but till then antonia's works well for me!

I use Antonia's too and it is sweet but not disgustingly sweet like I think you are thinking of with royal. It accents a cookie nicely and doesn't harden up that much so you can't bite into it.

Ok Zamode,

Please explain the cookie strike and the cake pending strike.

I've noticed it in your posts, but missed the post where you explained it.

fourangelsmommie Will have to see if I can find the old thread, it's here in the Cookie forum..... Cake_Princess was trying to help me with decorating. I can bake but I can't decorate cookies to save my life and was getting reeeeeaaallly fed up with it. I said I was going on a cookie strike and stopped doing them for awhile, I think I did one month of the cookie club.

The cake strike is because all my cakes are boring and the same and I need a creative kick in the keister!

To stop royal setting quite so hard add 1 teaspoon of glycerine for every 1lb of sugar

Thnaks everyone. I'll let you know how your suggestions work out.

does Antonia' icing get firm enough that you can wrap the cookies in bags without messing up the icing and if so how long does it take to harden.

thanks

puppyloveconfections do you just leave the cookie out uncovered? I am contemplating filling an order for 150 cookies - all individually wrapped and am trying to see if I actually have the time to do them. I have to deliver them a week from Wednesday which means I have to wrap them Tuesday evening. If it takes 48 hours to harden I would have to have them decorated by Sunday night. We are going out of town on Friday and will be back Sunday afternoon so I would have to bake them on Thursday. I am guessing I won't be able to fill this order - concerned that the cookies won't taste fresh if I bake them almost a full week in advance - any thoughts?

I do leave them out uncovered.
You could probably package them up a bit sooner, but make sure that the icing has really set. The thicker it is, the longer it takes to fuly harden. Can you bake them on Sunday afternoon when you get back? They seem to cool pretty quickly. You could still ice them that evening.

HTH

Baking Sunday afternoon is going to be tough - I have a stacked cake that I have already said yes to. I have to have the cake ready for Monday so that means baking on Sunday to give the cake time to cool - unless I bake the cakes before I leave and freeze them (that would be my first time baking and freezing a cake). Oh and did I mention I have a 4 and 5 year old? I try to do most of this at night when they have gone to bed.............

You can bake the cookies ahead of time and freeze them, take them out on Sunday when you get home, ice them Sunday evening, and you'd be set. I've frozen them before and they thaw out fine, I can't even tell which ones have been frozen and which haven't by taste, texture or appearance.

I generally flood my cookies in the evening, let them dry overnight, then pipe on the detail lines the next morning. By that evening or the following morning they're ready to bag.

What design are you doing on the cookies? Multiple colors and lots of piping, or all one color?

I really think you would be able to fill the order from a time standpoint.

If it were me, I'd probably bake the cakes ahead of time and freeze them as well. Wrap well in plastic wrap, then in foil and put them in the freezer. Take them out to thaw (still wrapped) when you get home and decorate that evening or Monday morning. If something happened to delay your return home on Sunday afternoon, it'd be nice to know that the baking is finished at that point and all you have left to do is the decorating!

hth!
Laura.

slejdick didn't know if cookies could be frozen - how would I freeze them - ziplock bags with wax paper between the layers?

they will be butterfly cookies with some piping detail

I make sure they're cool, then layer them in a container with wax paper between layers of cookies, just to make sure they can't possibly stick (although I don't think they would) and freeze the whole container. Leave them in the container to thaw, so you don't have a problem with condensation.

I think the containers would protect them better than ziploc bags, to make sure they don't bump up against each other and get chipped edges.