I do.

I do promise you that these cookies are easy to make.

Wedding season – filled with lovely lace & rich fabrics, pretty baubles, luscious flowers and decadent sweets of all kinds – it’s a season of exquisite inspiration, and for those of us fulfilling the wishes of brides, or hoping to wow our lovely ladies with a sweet gift we’ve made for a bridal shower or for the wedding itself, rising to the occasion can actually be a stressful situation. It’s a time in her life she will always remember and cherish, and we want to make her happy.

If you’re in charge of making cookie favours, (like I was, for a different reason though, which I’ll explain in a second), a sweet and simple option are these edible sugar lace cookies. And I do mean simple. They’re easy to make, even if at first glance they may seem impossible to create. I’ve adorned mine with a pale pink flower and an adorable ‘I do’ flag (made by Laurel of Go Against the Grain. I love them! You can find them here if you don’t have time to make them), but there are so many other possibilities with these cookies! I’ve got a few more ideas for you, which I’ll share at the end of this post.

Now if you’ve got to make let’s say 200 lace cookies, you may want to stay on the simple side in terms of design, but either way, I have a little secret for you on how to easily make the edible sugar lace itself. And it’s a technique you can use for anything – cakes, cupcakes, hot chocolate (you’ll see)… The potential is endless.

Speaking of possibilities, the reason why I made these was for a wedding cookie collaboration. Anne Yorks of The Flour Box Bakery (who incidentally is on my Decorating Directory here, if you’re here because you’d like to order some cookies), graciously challenged some cookie decorators to pick up a copy of the May 2012 edition of Brides magazine, and use anything from that magazine to inspire our cookies. The results are stunning! Here are all the other cookies and the decorators who participated below:

1. Hani of Haniela’s (pages 154 and 189) – Facebook Page

2. Marian of Sweetopia (page 79) – Facebook Page

3. Lorraine of Lorraine’s Cookies (page 267) – Facebook Page

4. Callye of Sugarbelle’s (page 267) – Facebook Page

5. Vicki of Sweet Tweets (pages 128-129) – Facebook Page

6. Linda of Frog Prince Cake & Cookie Design (page 267) – Facebook Page

7. Debbie of Mt. Lookout Sweets (page 96) – Facebook Page

8. Kim of Kookie Kreations by Kim – Facebook Page

9. Samantha of Flour-De-Lis (page 80) – Facebook Page

10. Laura of Laura’s Cookies (Pages 142, 189, 267, and 286) – Facebook Page

11. Georganne of LilaLoa (page 105) – Facebook Page

12. Jill of Jill FCS – Funky Cookie Studio (pages 72-73) – Facebook Page

13. Anne of Flour Box Bakery (page 189) – Facebook Page

14. Liz of Arty McGoo (page 267) – Facebook Page

15. JoAnn of The Biscuit Box (page 79) – Facebook Page

I love each cookie decorators pretty creations! Thanks so much to Anne for organizing this and for inviting me!

It was easy to find inspiration in the lace and flowers everywhere in the magazine.

And my secret to the simplicity of making these cookies, one that you may already know about, is a confectionery icing called, SugarVeil.

What is SugarVeil?

SugarVeil is a confectionery icing which is like any royal icing; it can be piped, or used to flood cookies etc., but the absolutely unique (and amazing!) thing about it, is that it’s actually flexible and pliable while it’s drying, so that it can be manipulated into shapes just like a fabric would, for example. It may seem confusing, so let me show you what I mean in the tutorial below on these lace cookies instead:

*

How to Make SugarVeil Lace Cookies

Step One:

Make and bake the shortbread cookies.

Step Two: Make the SugarVeil icing according to the package instructions. You will need a mixer of some sort, even if it’s a $10.00 hand blender. Besides the SugarVeil powder, the only other ingredient is water. It’s recommended the icing sit for overnight, so I made the icing in the morning, and used it during the evening. (Same time frame).

Step Three: Make the royal icing and flood the cookies.

See here for videos on how I flood my cookies with royal icing. You can find lots of how-to’s in the the tutorial section above as well.

Step Four: While your cookies are drying, start working on the edible lace.

You’ll need:

• SugarVeil Lace Mat (of your choice), I used the following from SugarVeil.com for these cookies; SugarVeil Lace Mat, Flower Net Mat & Rose Mantila Mat
• Confectionery spreader (can be bought via SugarVeil.com or you can buy a wallpaper spreading tool)

a) Put a dollop of SugarVeil on the mat. If you have too much or too little you’ll be able to figure that out in the next steps. (Photo courtesy of SugarVeil).

b) Using the spreading tool, spread the SugarVeil out on the mat. You can move in any direction, as long as you distribute the SugarVeil over the whole mat. It helps to press down while you’re spreading too, that way the icing is forced into every little groove. (Photo courtesy of SugarVeil).

*Something to note… Above is a photo of the first time I tried SugarVeil a few months ago. Notice the fine bits of sugar in the holes. I forgot to do this one last (important) step:

c) Once you’ve spread your SugarVeil accross the whole mat, clean the edge of the spreader with a damp cloth, and do one last clean swipe of the whole mat. This will clean up all the edges. Here’s what my mats looked like this time (Sorry about photo lighting… took pics at night in my kitchen):

d) Once the SugarVeil has set, which can vary depending on room temperature humidity (anywhere between 2 hours to overnight), you’ll be able to easily peel the corners of the SugarVeil away from the mat. I let mine set for approximately 4 hours. Place the mat face down and use your fingers to start peeling away the lace from the mat, and then use your spreading tool to pin the lace down while you peel the mat away from the lace. Peel away approximately 3 inches or 8 cm at a time, reposition the spreader close to the mat again, and peel away. The key idea is to peel the mat away from the lace, and not the lace away from the mat.

Once you’ve peeled the mat away, you’re left with your edible lace!

You may be able to tell from the photos – the lace is pliable, and although it’s delicate, still fairly easy to work with.

Step Five: Besides manipulating it into ribbons or any number of shapes, you can cut out the pieces you need to suit your design. (Next photo is courtesy of SugarVeil).

Step Six: Place your edible lace onto the cookie and gently press onto the surface of the dry royal icing. (Make sure your royal icing has dried for at least a few hours. Drying time depends on humidity, but you should be able to press on the surface of the royal icing, without indentations happening). The SugarVeil lace easily adheres to the surface of the iced cookie.

Tuck the corners into the crevice where the icing and cookie meet…

or let the edges drape over the side. For some variation and height, I bunched up the lace a little on a few of the cookies.

Besides adding flowers, like the sweet little pink ones I have here, from Petra International, there are endless possiblities that SugarVeil provides. Imagine wedding dress cookies with sweet edible lace, or little lace bows! Add little edible pearls, isomalt jewels, airbrushed or luster dusted icing and a sprinkling of glittery disco dust. Just maybe not all of them at once. Or, maybe yes, whatever works!

Another version I played around with below, was made using some sugarpaste, dogwood flowers from this post here and this Coppergifts.com plaque cutter, but I preferred the soft, kind of shabby chic look with the pink flower instead.

You could also combine the lace with gumpaste medallions, like these which Susan Trianos has made on her tufted billow weave cake:

And not to digress too much, but don’t you just love those tufted billows?! I fell in love with them when I saw Mandie’s, {thejoyof} cake, pretty version on Facebook, and have since discovered that Susan Trianos began the trend of layering the ‘billows’ into a weave patten. I love it! I need to try a smaller version of it for cookies! If you’d like to give it a go btw, Susan has a DVD on it here (Which she so kindly express mailed to me the other day – woo hoo! Thanks, Susan! I’ve already watched it and can tell you that she’s thorough and excellent at teaching, it’s no wonder she’s an instructor at the Bonnie Gordon College!).

What I’d really love to try, is the billowing with the SugarVeil lace, with medallions or little roses in between.

Anyways, you get the idea. The sky’s the limit in terms of possible combinations!

I haven’t even mentioned tasting SugarVeil yet… Subtly sweet, a hint of marshmallow softness… Hard to describe, but really, not overly sweet and easy to bite into on top of the cookie.

And another idea, this time completely unrelated to decorating cookies, but so fun I just have to share it with you – Imagine dressing up hot chocolate with one of these SugarVeil lace designs… it slowly melts as you drink your hot chocolate. So charming! (Photo courtesy of SugarVeil).

For more techniques, you absolutely must see the SugarVeil YouTube channel here and the SugarVeil site here. Michele Hester, the talented creator of SugarVeil, shows you how to make the icing, spread it onto the mats, remove it, and shares a multitude of other ways to use it.

Sweet thanks to Niner of Niner Bakes for helping me with a few photos for this post! If you’d like to see her newest post, adorable wedding cake pops, you can find them here.

I hope this mini tutorial has helped you!  I welcome any questions or feedback… Have I forgotten to mention something?  Do you need clarification on anything?  Please ask or let me know.

Have fun creating!!

xo,

Marian