How to Make Cookie Easter Baskets

     With Easter right around the corner, make some cute cookie Easter baskets that you can fill with candy or use as place card holders on your Easter dinner table. It is an easy project that you can even do with your kids.

     With your favorite sugar cookie dough, roll out and cut 3 rounds, 3 rounds with a circle cut out of the middle and 1 slightly larger round for each basket you want to make. I found that 1 recipe of no fail sugar cookie made 12 baskets, about 2 3/4 inches in diameter. You can make them as small or large as you want.

     Bake and cool them. Next ice the 3 solid rounds and 2 of the rings with royal icing in the color of your choice. Each basket should be done in one color. Allow them to dry completely.

     Now on to construction. Place the 1 large uniced cookie flat on your work surface. Put a dab of royal icing as glue on top and put the solid iced cookie on top of that. Follow with the next 2 solid cookies followed by the 2 iced ring cookies. Finish off with the uniced ring cookie. Allow royal icing glue to dry completely.

     Now the really fun part. Decorate them as you wish, add handles, a basket weave pattern on the sides, little dragees, or other sugar decorations. I used 1/2 of a brown licorice stick as the handle, attached with royal icing as glue. Then I did a quick basket weave pattern down the sides but you can skip this and allow the pretty colors of the royal icing to show through.
     Now fill with candies, cookies or anything else you want for a fun and delicious cookie Easter basket.

Visit our website for some other cute Easter confections.  www.pattycakesncookies.com
    

Presentation Makes A Difference

     On a recent vacation to South America, I got to thinking about the desserts I was eating. Specifically, how the presentation of the dessert elevated something simple to something special. I will confess that ice cream and gelato are my guilty pleasures in life. I have tasted some delicious gelatos in Europe that needed nothing more than a spoon to make me swoon over them. In South America, and especially in the Galapagos Islands where the following pictures were taken, the ice cream was good, but not spectacular in the taste. Yet, at the time I was eating them, I thought they were great. I realize it was the presentation that elevated the simple ice cream to a special dessert.

Courtesy of The Finch Bay Eco Hotel.

                                       

Courtesy of The Finch Bay Eco Hotel

Courtesy of The Angermeyer Waterfront Hotel

     Now, don't get me wrong. I am not advocating beauty over taste. A bad tasting dessert will always be bad tasting, no matter the presentation. However, I now realize the truth in the saying that we eat with our eyes first. Looking at the pictures that I took of my different ice cream desserts, you will see what I mean.
     At Pattycakes & Cookies, taste and presentation always go hand in hand. Check out our website and see how we can make your next occasion spectacular. www.pattycakesncookies.com