A Pressing Matter...

 

 

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Once again, I had purchased another plastic impression cutter that looked too cool to pass up.  The ebay app for iPad makes it just too easy to make quick purchases.  Without giving myself time to think twice.  Whether or not it was deep enough for my 3/8" thick dough.  Which it wasn't...

 

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So rather than just admire the cutter taking up space, or roll my dough thinner (gasp...never!), I forged ahead and, although not my method of choice, pressed the cutter down into the dough to make an impression and then hand cut them.  Make sure to press enough to get all of the details.  A little time consuming, but really, I had no choice.  If the shape was a little more geometric, I could have used a square or round cutter, but apparently that's something else I overlooked in my haste...  Hand-cut dough isn't as pretty or clean but as you can see in the bottom right picture, the baked cookies don't look too shabby!  I also sometimes do this with regular (not impression) cutters - like letters.  Cut squares, circles, whatever shape you like, then take your cutter & gently impress it into the dough, cutting maybe 1/3 of the way into the dough, and it will leave an impression for you to decorate over after baked.  Or you can use it for cutters like, say, giraffes, that tend to break at the neck - simply impress them onto maybe a rectangle & ice the background in a solid color around the giraffe. 

 

 

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And the impression stayed nice and clean so that I could outline the sections before decorating.  Don't add small details like the eyes and mouth before flooding - they will get lost.  They are easy enough to add later.  (Although I guess I should have peeked at the cutter 'cause I did my mouth a little differently... oh well, no biggie : )  Depending on the size of the areas you will be icing, you may want your icing a little bit thinner for flooding.  These were a pretty good size so I was lucky : )  You may also want to outline again after flooding, like if you go over your outlines a little... like I did... Luckily they cleaned up nice : )

 

 

 

 

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BOO! 

 

 

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!