Have you seen him before?
This adorable basset hound, Charlie, can be found in all sorts of winsome, captivating and charismatic posts on The Pioneer Woman. You can find her book, Charlie the Ranch Dog, on-line and in bookstores everywhere, and if you’re interested in seeing the Twenty Steps to Writing a Children’s Book, Ree takes us through the fascinating process.
I copied the images from Ree’s Twenty Steps post, to make Charlie the Ranch Dog cookies.
If you’d like to make these decorated cookies here’s what you’ll need:
- Sugar Cookie Dough (click here for recipe)
- Royal Icing (click here for recipe)
- Circle Cookie Cutters
- Paring Knife
- Rolling Pin
- Parchment Paper
- Food Gel Colorings
- Piping Tips (#1 and #2)
- Piping Bags
- Couplers
- Kopykake projector, if you need help with drawing, like me!
- For a vlog on my favourite cookie decorating tools, click here
If you’re new to cookie decorating, you might want to check out my Cookie Decorating Tutorial and my Top 10 Tips here. These videos can also help you get started.
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How to Make Charlie the Ranch Dog Decorated Cookies
To make the cookies themselves I used round cookie cutters or printed the image I wanted, cut it out, placed it on my cookie dough, and used a paring knife to cut the dough.
Once you’ve baked your cookies, you’re ready for the fun part; decorating!
I’m not skilled at drawing, so needed the help of a Kopykake projector. You may not need it, but for how to use one and other alternatives please see my Kopykake tutorial here.
The first cookie is Charlie from the cover of the book.
1) I began by outlining the shape with royal icing, using a #1 piping tip.
1A) Once the outline is dry, flood the middle in with icing using a #2 piping tip. The consistency of the icing it important. If you like video tutorials, you can find one on consistency here. I kept my icing at just above the 10 second rule (11-12 seconds) for these cookies… Just a little bit thick so that the icing didn’t easily smoothe over. I liked a little bit of texture to simulate fur etc.
1B) Also flood the brown and black areas right away so that all the colours meld into each other. You can work in sections. For example, the tail is separated by the outline, so can be flooded at a different time than the head.
1C) Take a toothpick and swirl the brown and black icing together to create a marbled or feathered texture. (Marbling video here).
2) Once the base has dried for a minimum of 6-12 hours (you may have to wait longer, depending on the humidity of your environment), outline the shape again with a #1 tip. Also pipe the eye and eyebrow outlines.
3) Wait a minimum of 15 minutes-hour for the eye outlines to dry and add in details. (Photo below)
4) Add spots. If you’d prefer the spots to meld into the base of the icing, instead of being a little bit raised, they need to be added when the base is wet. (Wet-on-wet icing technique).
For the next cookie, the steps are essentially the same. I used the projector to outline with a #1 piping tip:
1A) Once the outline is dry, flood the middle in with icing using a #2 piping tip.
1B) Also flood the brown and black areas right away so that all the colours meld into each other. You can work in sections. For example, the tail is separated by the outline, so can be flooded at a different time than the head.
1C) Take a toothpick and swirl the brown and black icing together to create a marbled or feathered texture. (Marbling video here).
2) Once the base has dried for a minimum of 6-12 hours (you may have to wait longer, depending on the humidity of your environment), outline the shape again with a #1 tip. Also pipe the eye and eyebrow outlines.
3) Wait a minimum of 15 minutes-hour for the eye outlines to dry and add in details:
4) Add spots. If you’d prefer the spots to meld into the base of the icing, instead of being a little bit raised, they need to be added when the base is wet. (Wet-on-wet icing technique).
Finished!
Here’s the same Charlie on a different background cookie. For this one, I printed the image I wanted, cut it out, placed it on my cookie dough, and used a paring knife to cut the dough, then bake.
After the outlining, I followed the same steps as above. (As in the first and second cookie).
And can’t forget Suzie, Charlie’s best friend.
Here’s how to make her:
Outline using a Kopykake projector, or freehand, if you’re talented that way. 😉
Let your cookie dry for 6-24 hours. How long you need to wait depends on the humidity in your environment.
I recommend having a test cookie (a simple cookie with a layer of royal icing), so that you can actually touch the icing, or even break a piece of the cookie, to check.
Done!
I love what Diane deGroat, the illustrator of Ree’s book, did with these images of Charlie.
If you have any questions or comments, please drop me a line below and come join me on facebook, twitter, or youtube.
Happy decorating!
xo,
Marian