Holiday Cookie Decorating

Grab your favorite cookie cutters and turn some Sugar Cookies into a beautiful work of art! These simple decorating techniques on royal icing are so simple, your kids will have a blast with this!

For the royal icing recipe and the different consistencies (stiff & flood) of icing you need to make, see Royal Icing Techniques. All the techniques below use the Wet-on-Wet Technique – meaning that you create the design while the flood icing is still wet.

To make snowflakes, pipe a stiff outline around the cookie,then flood with the same color icing. While the flood icing is still wet, use another color of flood icing and pipe lines across the cookie as shown below. Then use a toothpick to pull out the color to create a crystal-like affect.

To create a wave pattern, pipe 2 different colors of flood icing, then with the toothpick starting at one side pull down through the colors,  move slightly over and pull up through the colors. Repeating the pattern until you get to the end.

For a mosaic, squeeze out 2-3 different colors of flood icing randomly onto the cookie, then use a toothpick to swirl everything around until you end up with a design you like.

To make a string of hearts, place small dots of flood icing in a row (not touching), then drag a toothpick continuously through the center of each of them.

Allow cookies to dry completely, about an hour, until the icing is dry to the touch.