Writing On Cookies

Cookies for a handwriting workshop.

Writing on cookies takes patience and most importantly the right consistency of royal icing.

If your icing is too stiff it will leave peaks and break and if it's too thin it will spread and your letters will gradually become indistinguishable.

When thinning icing for writing, I aim for the consistency of yogurt - a consistency that will hold it's shape but is still soft enough flow evenly as you pipe and not leave peaks.

The best way to test for proper writing consistency is to first practice piping onto a plate to test the icing. With my recent batch of cookies for a handwriting workshop, I did this and it saved me from ruining a few cookies.

Wait for the icing base coat on your cookies to dry before adding writing.

I started by using a #1 tip which didn't work with my icing. The tip wasn't large enough for the icing to flow evenly.  It zigzagged out of the tip and was impossible to control

I changed to a #2 tip and as you can see from the photo of my practice plate (below), that did the trick.

The #1 tip just made uncontrollable squiggles. That's a pretty bad looking "C". Switching to a #2 tip made all the difference as you can see from my "A's" and "B". Always test your icing on a plate before going for it on the cookies.

A final tip is don't decorate cookies when you are feeling rushed. Decorated sugar cookies keep for weeks so they don't need to be made the day before. Tackle the project when you can take your time and you will have much better results.