Hearts for Valentine's Day

You may have noticed that one of my favorite colors is pink. My blog is pink, my KitchenAid Mixer is pink, and most of my cooking utensils are pink! Obviously, it was about time for me to make some pink cookies. Lucky for me, I was approached to make some Valentine's Day cookies by a buyer on Etsy. She had ordered my Holiday Sugar Cookies, and thought it might be nice to have some for Valentine's Day, too. I wholeheartedly agree! Here are the cuties I created for her. 

As adorable as fully decorated cookies can be, they are a challenge to ship. When I make them, I allow them to dry fully first (usually overnight). Then, I package them very carefully. After some trial and error, I found that the best method for avoiding breakage and smudging is to wrap them individually in waxed paper. It's a bit more waste, unfortunately, but it ensures that the cookies arrive safely and intact. Obviously, I can never know exactly how they'll arrive to my customer; sometimes items arrive with a bit of damage if the postal carrier happens to throw the box around more than usual. Luckily, though, nine times out of ten the yummies arrive safely and in perfect condition!

Decorated sugar cookies are by far the most delicate thing available from my shop, so I wanted to try out some new methods that might make shipping and handling a little simpler. Though I never made them growing up, I have been aware that sugar cookies are also often made with thinner icings that harden completely when they dry. So I did some research, and decided to give the icing from this recipe a go. Unfortunately, I didn't have any corn syrup on hand, so I had to substitute with the closest thing I had: agave syrup. Things did not turn out as pretty as the picture.

Icing bubbles and crackles

As you can see, when the icing dried, lots of impurities started showing up, and it sort of looked like it had a bad case of freezer burn. Not pretty!

On the plus side, it was really easy to adjust the color with this icing, and I think I created a pretty nice ombré effect with the different shades of pink. Another plus is that they dried nice and solid, so stacking them was a breeze. Also not to be ignored was the taste. They really were delicious with this icing recipe! I think I'll give this a go again soon (St. Patrick's Day shamrocks?), and this time using corn syrup, and making extra sure everything is completely blended. Perhaps those adjustments will yield more attractive results.

I hope everyone has a wonderful Valentine's Day!