Pterodactyl Cookies

Did you go out and buy this cookie cutter for your Valentine's Day cookies?  

I did.  Well, I bought this cookie cutter.  I just didn't buy it to make lips.  I bought mine to make dinosaur cookies for Thing 2's birthday party.  Alas, my idea of a very themed birthday party got squashed and we are going fairly basic.  "He's going to be one.  He won't even know that you did crazy stuff for the party."  So?  It gives me something to focus my energy into.  Duh.  Oh well.  I'm still slipping in a theme.  Coming soon to a blog near you!

Ok, the cookie cutter.  I've seen amazing cookies being made with cookie cutters that were meant for something else entirely.  I love that.  I don't want to buy a cookie cutter for every little idea I might have.  Being inventive is fun.  Check these cookies out:

Lingerie Heart Cookies from how does she?

"Owl" Always Love You cookies from Sweet Sugarbelle

Spiderman Valentine's Heart cookies from Sweet Sugarbelle

Smarty pants girls huh?   To be in with the in crowd I turned my lip cookie cutter into Pterodactyl.  Thing 1 is beside himself with a plate full of dinosaurs he can eat.  Oh and I have to say how freakin' easy Royal Icing is to make now that I have my amazing, wonderful, coolest thing ever KitchenAid stand mixer!!  Thanks killer! 

{Don't freak out.  Mike and I call each other Killer for our pet names.  Like Jerry Lee Lewis "killer" not Ted Bundy.}

Pterodactyl Cookies

Equpiment:
1/2 recipe No Fail Sugar Cookies
1 recipe Royal Icing
Wilton Leaf Green food coloring gel
Wilton black food coloring gel
Tooth picks
2 Piping bags
1 squeeze bottle
1 teaspoon measuring spoon
Water


Method:

Roll out sugar cookie dough and using lip cookie cutter, cut out cookies and bake according to recipe.  Allow cookies to cool completely before icing.

Prepare icing recipe.  Divide icing: 1/4 cup for black remaining icing for olive green.  Using food coloring gel, tint icing until desired color is reached.  For dinosaur coloring, tint icing green first and then add a little black at a time, mixing between each addition.  Once desired color is reached, divide green icing in half (for piping and flood).  Put half of green icing into a bowl.  Put remaining half into a pastry bag fitted with a piping tip.

It's good to have a plan.  I drew out my cookies idea.

This helps me make sure I don't forget anything I wanted to do.  

It also keeps the cookies the same.

Using a #3 piping tip:

Pipe bottom of wings

Start in the center of the cookie and work your way out to each corner

Pipe top of wings

From corner work in, trace the edge of the cookie and move towards the center

Pipe top of head

If you need to wipe the icing and pipe again, wipe towards the middle

You will fill that space with flood icing anyway

Let piped icing sit for 15 minutes.

Prepare flood icing.  Take green icing you set aside in a bowl and add 1 tablespoon of water.  Mix until combined.  Add 1 teaspoon of water at a time, mixing between each addition, until a thick syrup consistency is reached.  {Icing should run off the spoon in a ribbon and sit on top of the icing in the bowl for a second before blending back in.}

Flood cookies

Use a toothpick to help guide the flood icing around the cookies and into the corners

This was my first piping try.  I learned the hard way that less is more.

My flood icing took over and the pre-sectioned lines looked bad once the cookies dried.

The thing are in bed.  Now I can finish my cookies!

Yes, there is usually some kind of snack and action figure hanging out on the kitchen table

Pipe the Pterodactyl's body.

Pipe the head.  Follow the top edge of the dry flood icing and then bring the bottom of the face to a point

Pipe the wing details.

Pipe the top of the head.  Squeeze and hold so the frosting bunches and then slowly move out toward the top of the cookie

Pipe the legs 

Pipe out and down at an angle, then straight down going past the dry flood edge, for the middle claw.

Pipe the feet.

Pipe two small claws on either side on the middle claw to finish the feet

Let icing set for 15 minutes.

Using black piping icing in a pastry bag fitted with a #2 tip, pipe eyes and nostrils.  Hold tip and let icing for eyes build a little for a bigger dot.  Nostrils should go onto the dry piped face line.

Night / Day

There you have it, Lip to Pterodactyl cookies.  I'd love to see someone who is much at piping make these so they can live up to their full potential.  But this is the first design I came up with myself and I like it.  :)  Marian at Sweetopia has an awesome idea to use a projector to help you decorate your cookies.  I definitely need to look into this.