A couple of years ago, I was introduced to the world of cookie decorating. At Easter, a good friend of mine presented me with a tin of the most beautiful cookies. They looked professionally done and they were almost too pretty to eat. I was inspired. I chose last Valentine’s Day to try making them myself. I thought it would be a fun Sunday activity to do together with the kids. I had no idea what I was getting myself into. This was a foreign world to me and there were moments that Sunday afternoon (early evening and into the late night) I wished it would have remained that way.
The day started with the instructions and shopping list. My friend gently encouraged me by saying that they only looked overwhelming. I had never even heard of piping bags, couplets and meringue powder. With the assistance of the nice woman at the bulk store, I armed myself with all of the necessary supplies. I was in the bulk store for over an hour trying to choose the right size piping things and colours. It had been a lot of work (and money) already. My enthusiasm was waning early.
Preparing the cookie dough was easy. I like to bake...I was remembering why I took this challenge on in the first place. I failed to read through the instructions far enough to read that the dough would have to chill for an hour. Much of the day had already been eaten up by the gathering of materials. Now we would have to wait even longer. My daughter was ready to go into hysterics at this point because all she wanted to do all day was decorate the damn cookies. I made a mental note to prepare the cookies the day before next time so that family fun day might actually be fun.
Eventually, the dough is chilled and rolled and cut into hearts. They are baked and ready for decorating. I had no idea of the delicate dance it would now take to make all the various colours of icing, some to spread over the whole cookie and some to use for the finer details. I was up to my elbows in red and pink frosting but I was able to give my daughter the satisfaction she was craving of decorating a few cookies. I gave her a knife, some sprinkles, and a bowl full of frosting. I knew she wasn’t ready for the ‘real deal’ of cookie decorating.
I was beginning to wonder why my friend had encouraged me to do this at all. Oh wait, she hadn't encouraged me...I had been inspired. Ugh, why is it that everytime I am inspired by something I feel the need to ruin it by trying it myself. Why hadn't she warned me how much work this was going to be? Maybe she has a different skill set than me. Maybe I was not cut out for the world of fancy cookie decorating. There was no turning back now. I was in too deep.
I still had not decorated one single cookie myself and it was time to put the kids to bed. I remained in the kitchen with dozens of undecorated cookies, as many bowls as I own with various shades of frosting in them and equally as many piping bags loaded and ready to go. It looked as though a Valentine’s Day bomb has exploded in my kitchen. I got to work. I piped around the edges, filled them (another new term for me) with watered down frosting and then painstakingly decorated each cookie in its own unique way. It was midnight before I would finish. MIDNIGHT. This was supposed to be a Sunday afternoon activity and it had consumed my entire day. And I still had to clean up.
I crawled into bed absolutely exhausted and sure that I would never, ever decorate cookies again. But, I have to say, that when I looked at my cookies with fresh eyes the next morning it felt good. The kids were excited to eat them and, in some small way, they made that Valentine’s Day special. Only a person clearly out of their mind would ever attempt to engage in such nonsense again. Yet, for some reason I can’t explain, as this Valentine’s Day approaches, I am getting the itch to do it all over.
(A sampling of last year’s cookies. In my mind, they were a lot more amazing than this…)
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