Pool Party Cookies and Cake Pops

So my fancy/obsession with cookie decorating continues. We were invited to a pool party last Sunday. It was great fun seeing old friends and making some new ones. JJ and his wife recently purchased a new home. We had never been so as house warming gifts, I brought cookies and cake pops. Although not perfect in appearance, they have kids, so I knew they would be eaten and loved. 

 F U N D A B B L E R  F A C T 


One of the lead producers of watermelon in the US is Arizona! And in Japan they grow watermelons in cubes so they ship better. Crazy! 

Sugar Cookies: (Taken from Glorious Treat's recipe for sugar cookies Thank you miss!)

INGREDIENTS

All purpose flour - 3 cups

Baking powder (ideally without aluminium) - 1 teaspoon

Unsalted butter - at room temperature 1 cup (2 sticks)

Sugar - 1 cup

Egg - 1 large

Vanilla extract - a good quality 1 teaspoon

Parchment paper

 INSTRUCTIONS (Copy and pasted from Glorious' site) 

In a medium bowl, stir together the flour and baking powder and set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, using the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  This should take about 3 minutes.

Add the egg and vanilla and beat another minute or so.

Add the flour mixture slowly.  (Be careful not to add too much at a time or you will have a snowstorm of flour.)

Blend until all of the flour is incorporated and the dough begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl.

Take the dough out of the bowl and place it on a piece of parchment paper.  

Using your hands, knead the dough a few times.

Place the dough in a large plastic (ziplock type) bag and refrigerate for about 2 hours.  If you want to speed up the chilling process, place the bag of dough in the freezer for about 20-30 minutes. Just don't forget it in the freezer, or it will become to firm to work with (and then you'll have to wait for it to thaw).  

When it's almost time to remove the dough from the refrigerator (or freezer), preheat oven to 350 degrees (F).

-When the dough has chilled and is firm, take out about half of the dough, leaving the rest in the refrigerator (until your ready to work with it).  

For your Royal Icing Glorious suggests Wilton's recipe, and that is what I used:

 INGREDIENTS 

Meringue Powder - 3 tablespoons

Confectioners' sugar - 4 cups (about 1 lb)

Warm water - 6 tablespoons

 INGREDIENTS 

Beat all ingredients until icing forms peaks (7-10 min at low speed w a heavy-duty mixer, 10-12 minutes at high speed with a hand held mixer).

Cake Pops - See Bakerella for explanation on how to make Cake Pops.

In summary: make your recipe of favourite cake, add 1 can of frosting, roll and refrigerate. Coat your lollipop sticks with a little chocolate and dip into your cooled cake pop balls. Leave in the fridge again until it is firm. Then form, and coat, and decorate! 

A helpful tip, I learned to make a mini bain-marie while making my cake pops so that my chocolate stays melted. It was fabulous. I would pour out the water and add more boiling water from my kettle. Loved it!