I have recently started cookie decorating, and am slowly learning time saving tricks, but was wondering if anyone had some great tips out there that would help save some time and hassle!

One of my tricks- When I am ready to pour my icing into my decorating bag, I put the bag into a large glass, that way I dont have to hold the bag and can use two hands to use a spoon to scoop my icing into the bag. The glass supports the bag nicely and also catches any icing that runs out of the tip!

Hope you can all share some of your time saving tips!
Thanks!

Good question. Here are some previous answers:

http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-55796-newbie.html+tips

http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-50039-newbie.html+tips

Here are some of my cookie-making tips:

Keep your royal icing filled decorating bags point down in mugs lined with damp paper towel to keep the tips from clogging.

When decorating, I place 7 or 8 cookies (or however many, depending on size) around the edge of a freezer paper-lined 18-inch round cake board, then place the board on the flat Wilton turntable.

To economize on drying space, I went to my local pizza place and got a bagful of those little 3-legged plastic things they put in the middle of the pizza to keep the box from sticking to it. I arrange about 4-5 of these around the cookies on my 18-inch board and stack the boards.

When tying ribbon around individual bags, I hold the bag closed with a pin-curl clip (my apologizies to decorators younger than 30 who probably don't know what a pin curl, much less a pin curl clip is!). Any small spring-loaded clip will work.

When a customer orders cookies on sticks, not in a bouquet, I insert the cookie sticks into a block of styrofoam for transport. Much easier, neater and safer than trying to arrange them lying down and stacked atop one another. See picture.
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DianeLM: Those are great tips! I especially like the 3-legged pizza support idea! I'll be utilizing that one!

This is why I love this site so much! Thank you for your GREAT ideas! I will trying them as well!

I like using squeeze bottles for flooding the cookies with royal icing and outlining. If they have the caps that makes them better them I keep them upside down while I decorate so they icing is always ready to go. I also keep a couple of sheetcake boxes on hand for drying the cookies that way they don't get accidently destroyed by stray children or something dropped on them--I can keep them covered easier too.

I use fondant on my cookies and melted chocolate to decorate with if I have a quick order to do or if there is a large order and it needs to be wrapped asap.

Wow all this information is so great to know. I love the way DianeLM puts them in a box with the foam to keep them standing. Its a great idea and really good for transportation.

Plan, Plan, plan
I know it sounds liek MORE time, but it will save you someday I know it will.

I make a list of all ingredients, and items I need before I start. I actually do this when I make the invoice. so I had 3- cookie boxes to do I made a list of:

x lbs flour, sugar
28 eggs
49 butter
x colors


etc

then 40 boxes
50 yd ribbon
10 lbs paper fill

etc


Go through each item and build it in your head from the dough all the way to the finished product. Of course accidents happen, but there is ntohing worse than running out of something when the stores are closed or you have no time to go out.

Another thing, for some reason i can never remember if I put the eggs in or not. So have a special container ready for your eggs. Precount the number for how much dough you are making. Each time if you can not remember you can compare the number of eggs left against how many you "should" have used by now. I often make 6-7 batches of dough so this is an issue often! I am a scatter brain sometimes!

Good luck and best wishes.

The best thing I've recently discovered is buying the Wilton coupler caps. Very cheap - and no more unclogging hardened RI with toothpicks or pins!

I put my bags inside a ziplock baggy with a damp paper towel in it. And if I am using parchment bags with out tips - I toss the filled bag inside a Disposable triangle bag. Then I just twist the top of the disposable bag and fold the top over. It keeps it from drying out and I can store it this way and don't have to worry about it leaking on anything.

Hi megamere!
I have just joined this site so I don't have any photos yet but some of my larger sugar cookie orders (150-180+) I have used cardcoard storage box tops to stage the cookies in while they are drying. I use either parchment or waxed paper to line the bottoms of them. I just stagger the boxes on top of each other (kind of crisscrossed) and placed them in my pantry. That way they weren't touching each other while the cookies were drying. I also use the binder clips - the medium and large black ones that you can get from office supply stores to close the coupler end of my bags while filling them. I just fold them above the coupler put them in a tall vase and fold the top over - I tend to use the larger bags and the vase seems to hold them up more secure. When I am ready to use I unclip them, screw on the tip and go for it. This is also helpful when storing it for short periods of time as I fold the bottom clip it and then fold the top and clip it. It keeps the icing nice until I am ready to resume.


Thought I would share and hope it helps.
Valere

[quote="acookieobsession"]Plan, Plan, plan
I know it sounds liek MORE time, but it will save you someday I know it will.

acookieobsession,
I am there with you. I actually buy in large bulk and premeasure and store my dry ingredients for dough in those zipper bags. I take a day, haul out the scale and cups and measure my ears off. I write on the bags if it is a double batch or single and what kind and then store those in a plastic tote. When it's baking time I only have to pull out the wet stuff and it seems to work really well. I also know how many set ups I have on hand and when another big order is warranted for my dry items.

I am with you on the eggs - I prestack them, the butter, and all of other wet items before mixing just to make sure everything is there, ready and accounted for. It's my little wet ingredients army lined up waiting for the dry bags... 5 sets of wet and 5 bags of dry. lol

My son thinks it's a hoot & I am nuts (he's 7) and helps me do the stacking - but he gets out of the kitchen when the mixers have the flour flying...

Valere

These are great tips everyone!

Thanks for sharing

Thank you all for sharing your Cookie ideas - wow, I am overwhelmed at how organized you all are. Thanks again.

One thing I like to do when I make the cookie dough is to roll it out using the smart rolling pin (with the rollers on each end) between sheets of parchment paper. I slide these rolled out slabs onto a cookie sheet and pop them in the frig. Later when I want to go ahead and cut out the cookies, the dough is all ready to go.

antonia74 does just about the best cookies I have EVER seen, handsdown. Do take time to look at her tutorial and pix. and also search past threads using her name or SUGAR AND COOKIE etc, I have learned so much from her knowledge.

I did a search and there are almost 200 hits in the forum search alone when I typed in

antonia74

she has a no fail royal icing recipie, also, she has a tutorial in the articles section.

when using the search and using more than one word, you MUST put the word "AND" inbetween the words. Good luck

Heather

Good morning, Cookie4!

Here is a link to antonia74's photo gallery.
http://forum.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-photos-by-antonia74.html

If you're like me, you will spend a LOT of time there. Antonia74 is Helen, she has a business here in Toronto, and she has some of the best work I've seen anywhere!

Her style is funky & elegant and just appeals to me.
(thanks again, Helen!)

Found it! Thank you!!