Wednesday, December 21, 2016

A GINGERBREAD HOUSE FOR A GINGERBREAD MAN



Gracie had a plan! She wanted to make a gingerbread house. 


She made a list of what they would need. 

And she determined how big the house would be. 



She thought Nina should decorate half of it and she would decorate the other half.



Gracie's half has a bottle cap for a wreath over the door. Is that a happy face in the wreath?


Nina's half has a couple of windows. 



Good job Gracie and Nina! 

PS - One box of gumdrops was plenty Nina said! Maybe Gracie was thinking ahead?

Don't use the ginger cookie recipe included in this blog for a house - it's too soft. Nina uses Lila Loa's No Chill recipe - found here. It's a good idea to recut the shapes while they are still warm from the oven. They often warp out of shape in baking. 

- posted by Momsu

Friday, December 2, 2016

FALL ISN'T OVER YET!

It's time to get Halloween off the blog but before we think about Christmas we need to enjoy Fall even though Fall is hardly a season here in San Diego. 

In a hurry I frosted my leaves and acorns in 90 degree weather as simply as possible and they were ready for Thanksgiving! 



Pumpkins aren't just for Halloween! 


I found a good acorn cutter on eBay and hope to do something fun with it next Fall.

- posted by Momsu

Saturday, October 22, 2016

EEK A SPIDER!

Nina and Gracie made Halloween cookies. Gracie chose a circle cutter so she could make spider webs! 

This one has a tiny spider.

Nina made spider webs too.


Pumpkins come in lots of different colors. Here's a happy trio.
And a scary face!

Nina ran out of icing before all of the cookies were finished and had to mix up another batch - how many times has that happened to all of us? She colored some of it black to use with the white royal icing. It was perfect for ghosts 
and bats
and my favorite - a white pumpkin with black dots!

For more Halloween cookies see Halloween in the Pages section at the top of this site. 

TRICK or TREAT 

- posted by Momsu


Monday, September 5, 2016

HAPPY APPLES FOR THE TEACHER



The school year has started or is about to start all over the country. Gracie will be in first grade this year. 

Nina and Gracie made happy apple cookies for her new teachers.  




And they made flowers too! Again here's the flower cutter with six petals. The most used flower cookie cutter in our collections! 



Gracie gave the flowers very very happy faces. 



While Nina finished up with some spirals and dots for the center.

Our yummy Ginger Cookies are perfect for fall! Find our ginger cookie recipe here.

For more apples see here and for more flowers see here


- Posted by Momsu



Thursday, August 11, 2016

SUMMER COOKIES

Nina and Gracie wanted to make Summer Cookies. 


Gracie had a plan! She drew a picture and they baked sugar cookies - hearts and circles. And they went to work decorating: 

Nina thought they needed a few sea gulls so they added those to Gracie's plan.

Great job Gracie – you followed your plan. And you did a great job decorating!
Now they have lots of fun cookies to thank summer school teachers and share with friends. 

- posted by Momsu

Tuesday, July 19, 2016

BUTTERFLIES FROM FLOWER CUTTERS

And once again here's the six-petaled flower we love to use! One time when Jill and I were making flowers and butterfly cookies and I was talking about Sugarbelle and how she is a wizard at turning cookie cutters into something else - Jill took some of the flower cookies we'd baked and turned them into butterflies - perfect! Good job, Jill! 

Other butterflies we've made can be found here.

- posted by Momsu






Tuesday, June 21, 2016

A SUGAR COOKIE INVADES THE GINGER COOKIE BLOG!


By now everyone probably knows about the wonderful trick of putting light corn syrup (Karo) on a cookie after it's baked to attach sprinkles. Paint corn syrup with a small brush on the cookies where you want the sprinkles to stick and pour on the sprinkles. Then tip off the extra and what stays on the cookies is where you painted. It is so much easier and prettier than trying to get the sprinkles exactly where you want them BEFORE you bake the cookies - which I spend hours doing before I read about this trick. Sprinkles are decorative, fun and add a little crunch to your sugar cookies. And here's that six-petaled cutter again! 

- posted by Momsu

Thursday, May 5, 2016

BIRTHDAY BEACH PARTY FAVORS

Nina co-hosted a 40th birthday party for a friend recently - the theme was "The Beach." It was at the home of another friend, not at a beach at all, but there were plenty of fun seaside decorations to make things festive. With a nod to the theme she made sand dollar and sea star cookies for favors.
 
 

The theme colors for the party were aqua and coral and Nina mixed up a nice shade of each. 

And the color of the sand dollar reminds us of our beautiful California beaches. 


Nice job, Nina!

- posted by Momsu

Wednesday, April 13, 2016

COMPLICATED EASTER COOKIES - WHAT NOT TO DO!

Easter was early this year and the cookies were baked in time. But then . . . 

They just didn't get decorated! 
I planned what I wanted to do on the computer - my favorite planning tool. I take a photo of the cookie and decorate it with the drawing tools in MS Publisher. It's a lot easier than decorating the cookie with real icing! 

This is a blog about what not to do and what I finally did do.


 
When I decorated the cookies I piped the flowers first and had too much stem so I added leaves. 

The first thing not to do is to attempt a complicated design without either a template or a KopyKake projector. I didn't take the time to make a template and I don't have a KopyKake projector. 

The second thing not to do is to try to make a complicated design when you are in a hurry! And Easter was long gone so I didn't have much incentive. I liked the design but since I just wanted to finally get the cookies finished and was in a hurry - the elements didn't line up very well. 



In a hurry - medium sized eggs came out much better.


And little eggs came out best of all.


I made my favorite bunny without the arms this year (see here for arms) but with a different flower to match the eggs.

And where there's a bunny there has to be a carrot or two! 

"Good job!", everyone who got Easter cookies made in time for EASTER! 

- posted by Momsu

Friday, February 12, 2016

UNCOMPLICATED VALENTINES

Sometimes a simple heart says it all. At The Ginger Cookie we don’t make cookies to simply look at. That is not to say we don’t admire that type of cookie.


We try to keep our cookies uncomplicated - not “simple” but something you can actually eat and enjoy. Nina made some cookies this year that do just that.



These are sweet little hearts you can nibble on - they are uncomplicated and they are different.
 



Good job Nina!

- posted by Momsu