Paris Themed Wedding Cookies

I was honored to make these Paris themed cookies for our niece's wedding party. I used my favorite sugar cookie recipe by Sugarbelle and her royal icing recipe. I've made so many cookies from these recipes that I have them memorized by now.

Wedding Shower Heart Cookies

Wedding Shower Cookies - Piped Lace and Brush Embroidery

1D party cookies

Vanilla Birthday Party Cookies

This was my first time making 1D cookies. When I was asked if I could make them, I have to admit that I didn't even know what 1D was! Thank you Google! Turns out, 1D, stands for One Direction, an insanely successful boy band - I guess I'm embarrassingly behind the times!

These cookies are made with Callye Alvarado's (SweetSugarBelle) sugar cookie recipe.

Callye is crazy talented! She is my cookie guru if there is such a thing!

I made Callye's recipe but I used Nielson-Massey Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla Extract and because I love the little specks of vanilla seeds, I added a small dose of Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Paste The icing is vanilla royal icing. 

Spring Has Sprung!

Well, I thought "spring had sprung" but it was cold and snowing (almost invisible but still) on Tuesday when I brought these springy cookies to Ladies' group - it was the only thing spring like about Tuesday morning! The cookies came to mind when I decided to bring Strawberry Cake for my contribution to the food table. I just had to make strawberry minis to go with the cake - more as decoration than anything - they are just cute!

The cookies are an adaptation of my favorite sugar cookie recipe by Sugarbelle. I made them with Nielson Massey Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla and Nielson Massey Orange Extract and 1 tsp. of grated orange zest. They were  very deceptive - they looked like strawberries but tasted like orange - what trickery!

I made some little blossoms for some of the "strawberries" with white fondant and added a dot of yellow royal icing for the center of the fondant blossom. 

Of course - in my tradition of "over doing" almost everything - I just had to add a few chocolate dipped "strawberries" to the plate of springiness :) I also brought some actual chocolate dipped strawberries to completely take it over the top, because that's just how I roll ;) Looking at my "daisy" cookies in this pic - they look like fried eggs ;( oops

Birthday Girl Cookies

These cookies were made for a little girl who was turning 7 - her party theme was cupcakes, so of course the cookies had to be cupcakes in girly colors. 

These cookies were made using the sugar cookie recipe from Sugarbelle's site. This dough is easy to work with and tastes great with different flavorings - for these cookies, I used pure almond extract to flavor the dough and I used Wilton clear artificial vanilla to flavor the royal icing. I haven't found anything else that is "oil free" to use for the royal icing. If anyone knows of any other oil-free flavorings, please let me know, I'd love to try something different. I make my dough using a mixer, someday, my mixer will go ca put on me because of the volume of cookie dough, cake batter, buttercream and mostly - royal icing that I make. My goal is to be able to buy a KitchenAid stand mixer - they are beautiful  and seem to be the stand mixer of choice with most bakers. Someday.... I can dream :)

Just had to make a special cookie for the birthday girl herself :)

I don't have cookie cutters for the cupcake or the tiara so I did templates on paper and used them to cut out the cookie dough using a knife - it takes longer than using a cutter and is a bit of a pain but you gotta do what you gotta do!

Fancy Caramel Apple Cookies

Yum!
I have only made these once but everyone loved them and I think I should make them again. SOON!
This recipe is adapted from a recipe I found at Callye Alvarado's site: The Sweet Adventures of Sugarbelle - she is awesome, so talented and generous - she has so many tips, tutorials, recipes and great advice - she is my cookie hero. I don't know her but have been a fan for many months. I hope she doesn't mind me sharing her recipe here on my humble little blog with no comments so far. If you want to check out her blog - and I think everyone should, follow the link here
Okay - the recipe - when I say "adapted" in this case it means, I substituted some ingredients listed in the original recipe for things I could find here in my neck of the woods. Below, the recipe is as I made it with substitutions...if you follow the link above, you will find Callye's recipe.


3/4 c. unsalted butter, softened
1/2 c. granulated sugar
1/2 c. dark brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla (I used Neilson Massey Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla - it is my go-to vanilla of choice)
1/4 tsp. butterscotch flavoring - I used LorAnn Butterscotch Flavor which is kind of extra strength which is why it is    only a quarter teaspoon
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
2 1/4 c. all-purpose flour
1 medium Granny Smith apple, diced {about 1 cup} next time I will up the apple by about another half cup

1 c. pecan pieces
1 tbs. dark brown sugar

caramel sauce - I used stuff that can be heated and used to cover apples, got it at Bulk Barn
Hershey's dark chocolate chips and white chocolate chips (it's what I had on hand)

Method is the same as the method used by Callye at the link above. I am in no way trying to "steal" her recipe - just letting everyone know that I have tried it and it rocks! I am sure it would be even better if I could have made it exactly as she did!

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