Sugar Cookies with Royal Icing

I posted this on my personal blog last spring- and I realize that I forgot to post it here.

I went through some serious research to find our favorite sugar co0kie recipe... basically I made a ton of different ones, and this is the one that was most loved.

Mrs. Field's Sugar cookie recipe. It's a more dense, non-fluffy cookie. Very moist and chewy.

Mrs. Field's Sugar Cookies
2 C. flour
1/4 tsp. salt
3/4 C. sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
3/4 C. butter
(Use real butter- not margarine, or it just doesn't taste as good/and has a dry texture)

Preheat oven to 325
Cream together butter, sugar, egg, & vanilla- then add the dry ingredients.
(The recipe says to refrigerate for one hour- but I always skip that part.)
On a floured surface- roll out dough, and cut into desired shapes.
Bake for 13-15 minutes (or 11-12 minutes, if you want them soft)

*This recipe only makes about a dozen cookies (with the big cutters like I have). I've only ever doubled the recipe, and it turned out fine.

**Trick I learned: If you don't want your cookies to have an overly "flour" taste after rolling them out.... the trick is to use a half flour/half powdered sugar concoction to roll the cookies out with. It leaves the cookie a little sweeter than if you just use the flour alone. **

After the cookies were done baking/cooling down- I'd usually just put a slab of frosting on them and be done with it.

-BUT-

I've been checking out all of these cool baking/cooking blogs and have been noticing that the majority of the cookies were decorated with a hard crunchy frosting and it was smooth and beautiful. I decided I wanted to try that too.
First: I found out that the technique is called 'Flooding'.
Then I watched some You-Tube videos on the how-to's. I thought I'd start out simple.
You start with what's called a Royal Frosting recipe:

2 egg whites
2 tsp lemon juice
3 cups powdered sugar.

Combine the egg whites and lemon juice and beat it until STIFF peaks form. (in my kitchen-aid it took almost 10 minutes)
Once stiff peaks are formed, add powdered sugar one cup at a time. (remember to scrape the sides of the bowl to get any rogue sugar)
* this recipe was enough to decorate/flood about 20 of the cookies*

VERY IMPORTANT: this icing is MADE to harden- quickly. When you aren't using the portion of frosting still left in the bowl, it is very important to put a damp towel over it. Otherwise- it just hardens and you have to start from square one.

For the flooding technique, you need to pipe a boarder around the cookie. I didn't tint my icing to do the piping. Make sure your piping is fluid and there aren't many start/stop areas that the flooded parts might leak. (I used a size 7 Wilton piping tip)
After piping around your cookie (and doing any decorations like the zig/zag on the egg, the face on the bunny, and the center of the flour), let the cookie/frosting sit for about 15 minutes to let the icing harden a little.

After that time has expired, take a small bowl and fill with icing, and food coloring (I used Wilton brand cake decorating coloring)- then add about 3-4 teaspoons of water (one at a time) to get a runny texture. (in every clip I watched about the flooding part, they suggested that you put the runny icing in a squeeze bottle. I didn't have one... nor did I feel like driving the one mile to Michael's / JoAnn's and getting one. I used a size 2 Wilton piping tip instead. While it is possible to decorate like this- it was a lot more messy than if I had a squeeze bottle.) I just decorated the cookies one color at a time, and when one color ran out, I made another. It all worked out.
I did ruin a few cookies by making the icing a little to runny.... it wasn't pretty... and wasn't fun to clean up. I suggest Googling 'flooding cookies'- and watching a few videos before attempting this style of decorating.

Pros: The colors are vibrant! They don't get watered down like in traditional frosting recipes. It makes for pretty cookies.

Cons: It takes forever, and it's pretty messy.

I learned through all of this that Chip doesn't like crunchy frosting, even though it's pretty. Ohh well, he doesn't like sugar cookies that much either... :)

I actually enjoyed playing with the icing and decorating the cookies. I'm glad I now know how to do it. :)