Costco Connection

BAKERELLA

Over-the-Rim Cookies and Tea

Supplies

Cookie dough
Circle cookie cutter
(about 2 inches)

Knife Frosting Assorted food colors

Meaghan Mountford created this recipe for her blog, TheDecoratedCookie.com. These cookies make a lovely Mother’s Day gift for the tea or coffee drinker in your life.

Make dough according to your favorite sugar cookie recipe, and chill. Roll out dough and cut out circles. With a knife, cut out a slit about ;/8 inch wide and about 1 inch long toward center of each cookie. Bake according to recipe and let cool.

Prepare your frosting and mix in your preferred colors. Prepare frosting bags with couplers and

Frosting bags
Couplers
Decorating tips
(sizes 2 and 4)

Rubber bands Tea or coffee Mug

Spring Fling Cake Pops Butterfly- and flower-shaped cookie cutters provide an easy way to achieve distinctive shapes in these adorable cake pops from Bakerella’s Cake Pops by Angie Dudley (Chronicle, 2010).

Bake cake according to package directions in a 9 x 13-inch pan. Cool completely. Cut cake into 4 pieces; crumble each piece into a large bowl by breaking a section in half and rubbing the two pieces together. Break up any large lumps.

Add three-quarters of the frosting. Mix into the crumbled cake until thoroughly combined. Basic Cake Balls

1 18.25-ounce box of cake mix

1 16-ounce container of canned frosting

BAKERELLA

decorating tips, fill with colored frosting and close tightly with rubber bands. Use the size 4 tip for the background color and size 2 tips for the detail colors. (Note: Use the background color for most of the frosting, about 1 cup or more, and use only half of it to fill the frosting bag.)

To flood the background, pipe an outline around the cookie, being sure to also pipe around the slit. Let set about 15 minutes. Thin the reserved frosting of the same color with water, a few drops at a time, until it is the consistency of very thick glue. With a small spoon or squeeze bottle, pour some on the cookie inside the outline. Let frosting flood to edges, encouraging with the back of the spoon if needed. Let set well, at least a couple of hours. Pipe details with the rest of the colors. Let cookies dry overnight.

Cover with plastic wrap and chill for several hours in the refrigerator, or place in the freezer for about 15 minutes. You want the balls to be firm but not frozen.

Mold half of the shaped chilled cake balls using a small flower-shaped cookie cutter and the other half using a small butterfly-shaped cookie cutter. Press the cake mixture into the cookie cutter until it fills up the shape.

After shaping, put the cake balls in the freezer for about 15 minutes to firm up again for dipping. Once they are firm, transfer them to the refrigerator.

Melt the white candy coating in a microwave-safe plastic bowl, following the instructions on the package. The coating should be about 3 inches deep for easier dipping. (I usually work with about 16 ounces of coating at a time.)

Supplies

48 uncoated Basic Cake Balls
Butterfly-shaped cookie cutter
(1;/; inches wide by ;/4 inch deep)
Flower-shaped cookie cutter
(1;/; inches wide by ;/4 inch deep)

48 ounces ( 3 pounds) white candy coating Deep, microwave-safe bowl

48 paper lollipop sticks

24 licorice pastels

24 yellow gourmet mints, or similar candy Toothpicks

216 pastel confetti sprinkles (for flowers and butterflies)

48 jumbo heart sprinkles (for 24 butterflies)
48 rainbow color stick sprinkles
(for 24 butterflies)
1 Styrofoam block

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Arrange tea or coffee and cookies in cupcake liners and wrap in clear plastic bags. Give to Mom with a mug. Makes 2 to 3 dozen cookies.

When you are ready to dip, remove a few shaped cake balls from the refrigerator at a time, keeping the rest chilled.

One at a time, dip about ½ inch of the tip of a lollipop stick into the melted candy coating, and insert the stick straight into the bottom of a butterfly- or flower-shaped cake ball, pushing it no more than halfway through. Dip the cake pop into the melted coating, and gently tap off any excess coating by holding the pop over the bowl, tapping your wrist gently with your other hand and rotating the lollipop stick. Before the coating sets, attach 1 licorice pastel to the front side of each butterfly and 1 yellow gourmet mint to the front of each flower. Let dry in the Styrofoam block. For the flowers, use a toothpick to dot a small amount of melted coating on the fronts of the cake pops, so you can attach 1 confetti sprinkle on each flower petal.

For the butterflies, use a toothpick to dot a small amount of coating on the front of the cake pops so you can attach jumbo heart sprinkles and confetti sprinkles on each butterfly wing. Then insert 2 color-stick sprinkles in matching colors in the hardened coating on the top for antennae.

For an added detail, dot coating around the butterfly shape with a toothpick to define the wings.

Let dry completely in the Styrofoam block.

Tip You can also use yellow M&M’s or similarly shaped candy instead of gourmet mints for the flowers. However, the mints have a rounder surface, similar to that of the licorice pastels.