Customizing your own cookies
Margie Greenberg, the creative partner in the Flour Pot, offers these tips for decorating basic sugar cookies:
Fondant, traditionally used on cakes, is a clean, easy coating for cookies. Color it with gel paste, roll it out thin (it's sweet) on parchment, and then cut it to the shape of the cookie. Use a dressmaker's pattern-marking tool to etch "stitch" details on fondant used for shoe- or purse-cookie designs.
To add dots or lines to fondant, roll a base color fondant a bit thicker than desired. Place pea-size balls or thin ropes of an accent color fondant on the base and roll them together, working the rolling pin different ways to retain the desired shapes. Use textured fondant rolling pins for special effects such as a basket-weave design.
Brush corn syrup onto the cookies as an adhesive to hold the fondant. White royal icing is more forgiving than colors for novice decorators. While it is still wet, you can wipe off mistakes. For colored icing errors, let it dry, then gently lift it with a pick.
When piping the icing, fill the pastry bag only halfway. Release air from the bag before twisting the top to avoid spills. Be creative. Use small colored and shaped candies or cereals to decorate cookies.
For decorating supplies - fondant, meringue powder, gel paste colors, cutters and more - visit www.flourpotcookies.com, www.cakedeco.com, www.kitchengifts.com or www.sugarcraft.com. Supplies also are available at Fante's, Kitchen Kapers, and Sur La Table locations. Reprinted from Philly.com by Marilynn Marter.