The Decorated Cookie » kids

easy Cheerios birdfeeders with printable instructions

meaghanmountford — Fri, 17 May 2013 12:50:02 +0000

Ever the supermom wannabe, I of course volunteered to help out with the Family Fun Day at my daughter’s school, even though we couldn’t attend said Family Fun Day due to a family event up in Jersey. The day was garden-themed. My tasks were to turn pieces of cardboard into signs and to come up with a make-your-own-birdfeeder idea.

First, look at my awesome signs. I’m pretty proud of these, which is why I’m posting a photo here even though it has no place in this blog post.

Second, we made Cheerios birdfeeders. I thought about some alternatives first. I wanted to make birdseed ornaments, but every how-to I could find involved baking, which wasn’t going to happen with a line of kids on the school grounds. I thought about painting toilet paper rolls with honey and rolling them in birdseed, but imagine the mess 150 kids with honey could create. Not to mention some kids have sesame seed allergies. So a google search later and I decided on Cheerios birdfeeders. How did I miss that this existed? They are everywhere on google. Easy peasy, inexpensive supplies, limited mess, fitting for both the younger kids and older, and easy to tote around afterwards.

To make Cheerios birdfeeders…

you will need:*

Cheerios

pipe cleaners (younger kids)

floral wire (older kids)

instructions printable

*The Cheerios came from Costco. I also got these pipe cleaners and floral wire. I printed up these instructions. And I made a display be wrapping a Styrofoam block in green tissue paper and popping in a stick I got from the backyard. I also precut a bunch of pieces of yarn in case they wanted to add a bow to tie to their tree. To make the spiral Cheerios, you can use a big marker for the mold or make a paper tube from cardstock.

how to make Cheerios birdfeeders:

older kids: To make a heart, thread Cheerios on a piece of floral wire, leaving about three inches on each end. Twist the wire ends together to form a circle. Make sure to twist the wire right at the end of the Cheerios so the Cheerios aren’t loose on the wire. Twist a loop with the wire ends. Bend the Cheerios on the wire into a heart shape. Thread yarn through the loop to hang to a tree. To make a spiral, thread a Cheerio on a piece of floral wire and wrap the end of the wire around to secure the Cheerio. Thread more Cheerios to fill the wire, leaving a couple inches at the top. Twist the wire at the top to secure the cheerios and make a loop. Bend the cheerio wire around the paper tube to make a spiral. Thread yarn through the loop to hang to a tree.

Or, bend the wire into any shape you like.

younger kids: Make a loop at one end of the pipe cleaner, and twist to secure. Thread the pipe cleaner with cheerios. Loop and twist the other end to secure. Thread a piece of yarn through the loop and hang from a tree.

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do trail mix oat bites even belong here?

meaghanmountford — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 18:15:22 +0000

So yeah, these look a lot more healthy than most–um, all–of what you find here. And sure, these trail mix oat bites (that’s the best title I could think of) have rolled oats, coconut flour, wheat germ, and dried fruits and nuts and make a great fill-you-up-and-give-you-energy snack, but they also have a bit of sugar, maple syrup and butter. So please don’t desert me. There’s a little bit of me left in there. And if they weren’t so crumbly I’d have put them on a stick.

I’ve been really into homemade granola bars lately. I find being home all day I put my hand in the snack drawer a lot. Yes, we have a snack drawer. You see, when we bought our 1930s house, it came equipped with the original 1930s, totally not functioning, kitchen. And so we had to do a quick renovation so as to stop washing dishes in a bucket. I casually pointed out to our semi-custom cabinet dude how cool it was that the original kitchen had a bread drawer. My grandmother had one of those. You know, those drawers you pull out that have the metal lid? So semi-custom cabinet dude gave us a big drawer. He called it the “bread drawer.” He was so proud. He was so proud I did not point out that this big drawer had no similarities to an actual bread drawer. I use it for snacks. And I eat a LOT of snacks, so I’ve been seeking something more substantial than Goldfish. I mean, at least something that has vitamins. Plus, I’m not really a raw veggie snacker. (Seriously? How do people find that fulfilling?) So granola bars it is.

For these, I started out with THIS RECIPE for granola bars from SMITTEN KITCHEN. I made them in bar form and yum. They were good. So I added some more of some stuff, added less of some other stuff, and substituted different things to come up with a bite-size version of the bar.

how to make trail mix oat bites

adapted from Smitten Kitchen’s granola bars

(visit Smitten Kitchen for tips on more substitutions and whatnot)

1 2/3 cup quick rolled oats

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1/3 cup coconut flour

1/4 cup wheat germ

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

2 1/2 cups coarsely chopped trail mix (I used a cranberry nut mix)

2/3 cups nut butter (I used almond)

6 tablespoons melted butter

1/4 cup maple syrup

1 tablespoon water

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix everything together well. I used my hands to mix when the spatula could do no more. Take a bit and form a clump with your hands. Don’t try and roll a ball, these are too crumbly. Just use your fingers to make an imperfect sphere 1 1/2 inches in diameter. If necessary, add a bit more of a wet ingredient (butter, syrup, water or nut butter). Place on a baking tray lined with parchment paper. Bake 20 minutes or until they begin to brown. Let cool totally before eating. Makes about 36 bites.

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favors for a kid’s art-themed birthday party: canvas cookies and food pens

meaghanmountford — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 12:26:48 +0000

This whole kids-drawing-on-cookies thing is not new to this blog. My daughter first make her own cookie art HERE when she was just a wee lass of two. And I gave my niece these framed cookies and a set of markers for her 7th birthday. Well, I adapted that same idea for her 8th birthday, celebrated at a kid’s art studio (did they have those when I was a kid? because I would’ve loved that).

And drawing on food is old hat around here, of course. For tips on choosing and buying edible writers, click HERE.

To make these, I used a small rectangle cutter to cut out the cookies with my cookie dough. Then I prepared my royal icing and tinted it white and gold with Americolor Soft Gel Pastes (Bright White and Egg Yellow). Then, I prepared a disposable decorating bag with couplers and tip, size “4″. I filled the bag with the gold and closed with a rubber band. I piped rectangles on the cookies, leaving a border. Then, I switched the tip to size “3″ and piped the frame part. After the gold set a bit, I thinned the white icing to flooding consistency, filled an empty decorating bag, snipped the tip and piped to fill the frames. Let the cookies dry super duper well, overnight. (For basic cookie decorating how-tos click HERE.) To package, place a cookie in a cello bag, tie with ribbon and attach an edible writer to the ribbon.

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super duper crazy easy St. Patrick’s Day pops

meaghanmountford — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 17:59:25 +0000

I’ve a good bit o’ Irish in me, but long gone are the days of heading to an Irish pub in the wee hours to spend St. Patrick’s Day. Now I would so gripe about the long bathroom lines, spilled Guinness, and kids today. The most nuts I’d get this year may be to have neighbors over for said Guinness. And maybe crock pot Irish stew. And super duper crazy easy St. Patrick’s Day pops.

Melted candy on sticks is my go-to for everything. See all these from Halloween? And it’s so easy, my kid helps me make these all the time. A couple of weeks ago when Maeve’s cousins were over, we pulled out some baking trays, candy melts, lollipop sticks and sprinkles and they all made their own candy pops. Totally unplanned. Because that’s how low-stress these are, and I always have all the supplies and ingredients on hand.

To make these…

you will need:*

green candy melts

disposable decorating bags

scissors

rubberbands

baking tray

wax paper

lollipop sticks

*Find the candy melts, decorating bags and lollipop sticks in the craft store.

what to do: Line a baking tray with wax paper. Place about 1/2 cup of candy melts in a decorating bag. Microwave at 60 percent power for 90 seconds. Massage the candy and repeat at 30 second intervals until the candy is completely melted. Close the bag with a rubber band if you wish. Snip 1/4 inch from the tip of the bag and pipe a dot the size of a dime on the wax paper. Place the lollipop stick on the dot of candy and pipe a shamrock on top. Repeat to fill the tray, using additional decorating bags and candy melts as needed. Let set well, a couple hours at room temperature or in the fridge.

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gingerbread kids and the history of gingerbread cookies

meaghanmountford — Fri, 21 Dec 2012 19:00:10 +0000

Just wanted to send my best wishes to you all for a happy, healthy holiday season! I made these gingerbread boys and girls earlier this month for my daughter’s class. I used my gingerbread cut-out cookie recipe and royal icing recipe. They kicked off a study of fairy tales with these…

And because I’m a total nerd, below is a (large) excerpt from my first book (now out of print), Cookie Sensations. I include a chapter on the history of the decorated cookie, including gingerbread. So if you’re a nerd like me, enjoy!!

A BRIEF HISTORY OF GINGERBREAD COOKIES

Excerpt taken from my book, Cookie Sensations, published in 2007.

Gingerbread

No discussion of the decorated cookie is complete without a look at gingerbread. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, gingerbread, derived from the Latin name for ginger, “Zingebar,” came to be known from the fifteenth century onwards as a cake flavored with ginger and treacle (a British type of syrup) shaped into men, animals, and letters, and usually gilded (brushed with gold coloring). Gingerbread was primarily a fairground delicacy in Medieval times throughout France, Germany, Holland and England. Some English village traditions requested unmarried women to eat gingerbread “husbands” at fairs to increase the likelihood of meeting a man.

Shaping gingerbread into people is a centuries-old tradition. Queen Elizabeth I is said to have ordered gingerbread cut into the shapes of her courtiers. In Belgium, cookies were cut into folk characters such as St. Nicholas. In the 1600s, gingerbread men were sold in London streets, possibly inspired by the folk legend of the Gingerbread Boy who jumped out of his oven.

In the tale, a woman desperate for a boy of her own bakes a gingerbread boy and dresses him with currants, cinnamon, colored sugar, and chocolate. But the cookie jumps out of the oven and out the door singing, “Run, run, as fast as you can; Can’t catch me, I’m the Gingerbread Man.” He escapes all whom he encounters until his fatal outwitting by a sly fox. The legend found its way to America from England, though in Colonial days the tale was named “Johnny Cake.”

The enchantment of gingerbread inspires great literary intrigue. Gingerbread was one of the sweets brought to Sir Thopas in Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales of 1386. “They fette hym…real spicerye/ Of Gyngebred that was ful fyn/ And lycorys and eek comyn/ With sugre that is trye.”² Shakespeare, too, in Loves Labours Lost, writes of sacrifice in the name of gingerbread: “‘An I had but one penny in the world, thou shouldst have it to buy gingerbread.’”³ Dorothy Wordsworth shared this desperate love. The English prose writer (and younger sister to the poet Williams Wordsworth) found gingerbread tasty enough to include in her journal. In January 1803, despite the bitter cold, she and her brother left home in search of gingerbread to satisfy their cravings.

Gingerbread is not always held in such high esteem in the literary imagination. The British poet, William Cowper, in his 1783 poem, Table Talk, warns of the dangers of falling below one’s potential and of settling for lesser substitution: “As if the Poet, purposing to wed, should carve himself a wife in ginger-bread.”⁴ Such seems quite a reversal in sentiment from the aforementioned women at fairs eating gingerbread “husbands.”

Similar to gingerbread, “lebkuchen” was used in Germany to build “Hexenhaeusle,” or “witches’ houses,” romanticized and popularized by the story of Hansel and Gretel when published in 1812 as part of the Grimm brothers’ collected German folktales. Hansel and Gretel, seen as a drain on scarce resources, are abandoned by their poor parents despite their father’s reluctance. Alone in the woods, their furtive bread crumb trail home eaten by birds, Hansel and Gretel wander for days, starving, until they come across a house “made of bread” with a roof “made of cake and the windows of sparkling sugar.”⁵ They tear off pieces and stuff themselves, unknowing the cruel, old woman within purposely constructed the house to entice, trap, bake, and eat children. But Hansel and Gretel outfox the old crone and push her into the oven, saving themselves.

Cookies in America

Gingerbread spread to America by European settlers and was also popular at fairs and festivals. New England recipes for flat cookies cut into patriotic shapes were created for “Muster Day” or “Election Day.” Prior to the Revolution, shapes often depicted a king, but later, the American Eagle. The cookies were handed out to wives and children when militias gathered for officer election or for military training.

Other cookies had already made their home in America in recipe, if not in name. Martha Washington’s “Booke of Cookery and Booke of Sweetmeats,” a manuscript “curiously copied by an unknown Hand sometime in the seventeenth century,” was in Martha Washington’s possession from 1749 until 1799. The recipes for “cakes” are similar to what we today call “cookies.” For sugar cakes, the baker is instructed to “take 2 pounds of flower, & one pound of sugar, & youlks of 2 eggs, & a spoonfull of sack, & a spoonfull of rosewater, & make it up into paste with melted butter & roule it out pritty thin.” A beer glass is suggested to cut the cookies before baking in an oven “meanly hot with stone downe.”⁶

The cookbook even includes a recipe similar to the Royal Icing of today, dubbed “Paste Royall.” It is made with refined sugar, cinnamon, ginger and a “grayne of musk,” made into a paste. The decorator then is to “print it with your moulds. Then gild it, & serve it up.” For white paste royall, the baker is to put the sugar into an “alleblaster morter with an ounce of gum tragacant steeped in rose water.”⁷ Fortunately, today we have a bottle of white frosting color to achieve better results.

Gingerbread recipes are not forgotten, made with a gallon of “ye purest honey” boiled on the fire. Then, the baker adds “good white wine vinegar” to make the “scum rise” so you can remove it before adding a “quart of strong ale.” Ginger, licorice, anise seeds, red sanders, and a peck of grated bread are added before the baker presses the dough in molds to “make it into what fashion you pleas.”⁸ Another recipe suggests adding claret wine to make “culler’d” gingerbread.

Such collections of handwritten recipes were common at this time, as printed cookbooks were scarce. But the popularity of publications dedicated to good housekeeping and cookery is not specific to modern times. Gervase Markham’s early seventeenth century volume, the English Huswife, included advice on cooking, planting, brewing, clothing, and curing the plague. Its success spurred other publications into the eighteenth century. American colonists relied primarily on British presses, but British authors paid little attention to the needs of the New World and to American cuisine.

Amelia’s Simmons’s first edition of American Cookery in 1796, a practical, inexpensive, paperback book, changed this. Her book included recipes such as “Johny Cake” (sic) and “Indian Slapjacks” that required distinctly American ingredients. Simmons’s is the first cookbook to use the American term “cookie,” derived from the Dutch “koekje.”

Noteworthy is Simmons addition of a newly-born cooking method of using chemical leavening in doughs, similar to our baking powder or soda. Prior, bakers had beat air into eggs, but by 1796, an anonymous American woman had added a chemical to produce carbon dioxide. Simmons’s cookbook is the first known to suggest adding pearlash to gingerbread and cookie dough, a substance primarily composed of potassium carbonate and used to make soap and glass.

Simmons’s gingerbread cookie recipe calls for molasses in lieu of treacle to customize the sweet to her American audience. The dough combines cinnamon, coriander or allspice, “put to four tea spoons pearl ash, dissolved in half pint water,” flour, molasses, and butter (“if in summer rub in the butter, if in winter, warm the butter”). The mixture is kneaded and washed with egg whites and sugar.⁹

Simmons’s sugar cookie recipe calls for a pound of sugar, “boiled slowly in half pint water,” and the baker is to “feum well and cool, add two tea spoons pearl ash dissolved in milk, then two and half pounds flour, rub in 4 ounces butter, and two large spoons of finely powdered coriander feed, wet with above.” The dough is then rolled half an inch thick and “cut to the shape you please.”¹⁰

Cookie cutters

In America, molds and boards gradually disappeared in favor of emphasizing the outline of the desired shape. German settlers in Pennsylvania shaped gingerbread by hand into men, often displaying the cookies in windows. The English cut dough with a glass or tea cup. Martha Washington’s cookbook suggests cutting dough with a beer glass, as mentioned earlier. The idea of placing a metal rim around the outline of a carved mold originated in the mid 1600s, and by 1750, the cookie cutter as a shape independent of a mold came into being.

The 19^th c tin industry developed the art of cookie cutters. Tinsmiths used traveling shops, packing their materials and belongings on wagons. Most carried cutter patterns to ensure uniformity, but they would make cookie cutters to housewives’ requests if need be. With increased machinery, by the end of the century cookie cutters were sold in catalogs and stores.

Cookie cutters were first hung as tree ornaments in shapes such as stars, moons, suns, toys, animals, and humans. With the rise of Christmas as a commercial holiday, shapes of the season, such as wreaths, Santa, and stockings, soon prevailed. American cookie cutters of the 1800s were thick and heavy, usually with flat backs and sometimes with strap handles. Air holes cut in the back allowed air to escape to free the dough from the cutter more easily and were often large enough for a lady’s finger to fit through if an extra push was necessary. Shapes at this time included hearts, horses, rabbits, birds, long-dressed ladies, high-hatted men, horsemen, leaves, and flowers.

Bridge card party sets, with diamonds, clovers, spades, and hearts, were popular in the early 1900s, available in catalogs such as Sears Roebuck or The Bruce & West Manufacturing Company. With the rise of advertising, baking powder companies and flour mills began to sell cookie cutters with their printed slogans. By the 1920s, cookie cutters were mass produced in aluminum. Aside from more choices, a surprising consistency and uniformity among shapes survived the century, and the basic shapes remain the same today.

But throughout the decades, companies produced cookie cutters unique to their era. Like any relics from popular culture, cookie cutters lend insight into the interests and lives of a generation. Pillsbury released the Comicooky Cutters series in 1937, including paper stickers to apply to the cookies in the likeness of comic characters from Moon Mullins, Gasoline Alley, or Dick Tracy. In the late 1940s, the Educational Products Company sold Blondie and Dagwood cookie cutter sets, complete with their children and Daisy the dog.

Wrigley Spearmint Gum advertised Troll kits for kids through the cookie cutter company, Mirro, in the mid-1960s. For fifty cents, the kit included an aluminum troll cookie cutter with decorating tips. They recommended sticking “tiny candies for cooky eyes” or to sprinkle the top with “wigs of shaggy, tinted coconut” to get laughs and “score a fantastic hit.”¹¹

Plastic cookie cutters became popular in the 1950s. Hallmark introduced their first set of cookie cutters in 1971, offering brightly-colored plastic cutters with incredible variety. Cutter shapes included not only a wide assortment of holiday designs, but baby cookies, Disney characters, Snoopy and Charlie Brown, the Muppets, and Raggedy Ann and Andy.

Today, you can find copper, aluminum, plastic, or tin cookie cutters in just about any shape you can imagine for the twenty-first century: martinis, the little black dress, an electric guitar, a bikini, a hula girl, a fighter jet, pi, a lap top computer, the space shuttle…

A long history of shaping and decorating cookies precedes us. I’m not sure why these representations seem so specific to sugary treats. I’ve not heard of a carrot decorated as a British King or a meatloaf to mimic Raggedy Ann. Perhaps it’s the natural indulgence of sweets. There is something powerful and gluttonous about ingesting cookie symbols of religion, popular culture, nature, animals, and characters. We can consume tasty versions of the world by creating edible art, just by thoughtfully shaping dough and adding color.

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