Snowflake Cookies-Back to Basic

Decorated sugar cookies are so popular now, they make wonderful gifts and are such a yummy treat to enjoy any time. But where to start? Well the first thing you have to do is bake some delicious sugar cookies, make some icing, pick up the necessary tools that you can get at most craft stores, and most importantly, grab your cookie cutters from The Cookie Cutter Company!

Even though there is plenty of cookie decorating information on the web, I still get emails asking for the basic tools I use to decorate my cookies.This post in not really about how to decorate cookies, but what to use when you are going to do a basic cookie decoration. You will find that with the right tools, cookies cutters and some swirls and dots you can make a cookie that will bring a smile to anyone.

To make these cookies you will need the following cookie cutters

Snowflake 1.5"
Snowflake 4"
Snowflake 2.25"

You also will use the following tools

Couplers: Great to use when you are going to change decorating tips to make different designs on a cookie using the same color of icing

Pastry bags: The 12 inches, Wilton brand disposable bags are the most common to use. I do not recommend using sandwich bags or freezer bags, they just don't hold the icing well.

Twist ties: I use them to seal the top of the pastry bag and avoid any icing spill.

Tips: They come in many sizes but the most popular to use are tips #1,2,3

Toothpicks or the cookie stick: They are use to gently move icing to narrow corners and small spaces in a cookie, you can also use them to create designs like feathers, hearts or spiderwebs.

Tweezers: Are great to use to place dragees,nonpareils,sprinkles,confetti or any small decorations on a cookie.

Icing bottles: Is the easiest way to flood a cookie with icing, I still remember the days were I used to flood cookies with a spoon,yes, that was like a 100 years ago! it was such a mess. I now use the medium and large size only. There is another type of bottle that comes with a coupler, personally it doesn't work for me, but that's my preference, any of you might like it.

I like to keep my piping bags in a glass.I use a piece of wet paper towel in the bottom of the glass to keep the tips from clogging. You can always use any other stable container for it.