Chinese Sugar Cookies

This month I am really focusing on ideas for Missionary farewells and homecomings.  My nephew Paul is headed to the Taipei, Taiwan LDS Mission for two years.  I wanted to make some Chinese themed sugar cookies for the event.  I found some ideas online, but they all seemed for appropriate for a little kids birthday party — actually to be honest I wanted a Chinese themed sugar cookie without having to mix tons of colors and spend hours making cookies.  I contacted my brother John, and he sent me this Chinese character that means “good fortune” or good luck.  This seemed like an appropriate design for someone headed to abroad for two years.  Keep reading to see how I made these Chinese themed sugar cookies.

Step 1 – Chinese Style Sugar Cookies – Prepare Cookie Dough

I was so pressed for time when making these Chinese themed sugar cookies.  I know, excuses, excuses.  Baby Lizzie is now walking, climbing and getting into everything.  She keeps me on my toes!!!  I needed a way to make these cookies in as little time as possible.  I decided to go with chocolate sugar cookies for something different this time.  These are less likely to spread and the dough is so easy to work with.  Here is the recipe I used – my favorite rolled chocolate cookie.  When baked properly they have the richness of a brownie.  YUM!  If you like chocolate you need to try this recipe.

Did I tell you yet I had no time to make these?  Here is a way to get perfect squares without spending tons of time making the cookies.  They only wanted two dozen of these cookies for decoration so I quickly made a batch of dough (froze half of it for a later use).  I rolled out a big blobish rectangle to fit the size of my cookie sheets then baked the whole thing before cutting the squares.  5 minutes into baking, I removed the tray from the oven and cut the square shapes.  Place tray back in the oven and allow the cookies to finish baking.  SO EASY!  And the shapes are perfect!  I’m really not worried about wasting scraps because the kids WILL EAT every last crumb of this.

Step 2 – Chinese Themed sugar cookies – prepare the royal icing.  

Again, I had very little time to decorate sugar cookies.  When this is the case I choose to dip my  cookies in royal icing.  I prepared the icing as usual (freezing the extra because this two dozen will not need much).  You could use this recipe for ROYAL GLAZE ICING or you could use a traditional ROYAL ICING, recipe found here.

Thin just a tiny bit of the icing to a soft peak phase.  This will be used to do the Chinese characters on the cookies.  I used Americolor Black to get a nice color on the lettering.

Step 3 – Chinese Themed sugar cookies – Dip the cookies in thin royal icing.

Thin about 1 and 1/2 cups of royal icing until it flows like chocolate syrup.  It should not hold a peak.  If you run a knife through the icing it will smooth out in less than 3 seconds.  Here are some photos of how to dip the cookies in royal icing.

Icing should be very runny before dipping the cookies in royal icing.

So easy, just dip the cookie into the icing and wipe the excess onto the side of the bowl.  Look at this link to see more details on how to dip a cookie in royal icing.  Pop any large bubbles that may have formed.

Allow the surface of the royal icing to dry for at least 20 minutes, or until the icing starts to set.  I use a fan to help the icing set.

Step 4 – Chinese Themed Sugar Cookies – Add the royal icing characters

Add this point the surface of the cookie is set and you can add the characters.  Practice drawing them first if necessary.  There are lots of online tutorials to help with creating these characters.  Allow the characters to dry completely.  Using a fan helps to get a nice shiny finish on the characters.

I could stop decorating at this point.  I usually love the contrast and the simplicity of the cookie like this.  But…  I thought I would try something new.  So you could stop decorating these Chinese themed sugar cookies at this point or keep going.

Step 5 – Chinese Themed Sugar Cookies – Add the Bronze Pearl Dust

I decided I wanted these to look like a mosaic tile by giving this cookie an antique look.  This just took minutes.  I used a large brush to add the Wilton Bronze pearl dust to the edges of the cookies.  So simple and gives the cookies a more rustic look.

Look at the difference.  These cookies now look like old world tiles.

Here is how they looked in the end.  Lovely little old world Mosaic Chinese style sugar cookies.  Wow that was a run on sentence… Really easy to decorate and a hit at the missionary farewell.  Thanks for looking!

Some essential cookie decorating supplies for this project!